


The Second Chance

by BuizelCream



Category: The LEGO Batman Movie (2017), The LEGO Movie (2014), The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part (2019), The LEGO Ninjago Movie (2017)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Alternate Universe, Angst, Brotherly Angst, Brothers, Drama, Drama & Romance, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Legos, Male-Female Friendship, Mystery, Platonic Female/Female Relationships, Platonic Male/Male Relationships, Psychological Drama, Psychological Trauma, Romantic Fluff, Romantic Friendship, Sisters, Slice of Life, Story Arc, alternate ending of The LEGO Movie 2 changed to a happy ending, and many other arcs that if said here would contain heavy spoilers!, happily ever after gone bad, story filled with hints and foreshadowing, story goes through stages of arcs before conclusion, story that needs careful attention because it tends to mislead you, this story has a variety of character arcs and character dynamics, yet the story is carefully crafted
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-26
Packaged: 2020-10-18 23:42:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 47,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20647634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BuizelCream/pseuds/BuizelCream
Summary: This story is based on an alternate ending of The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part where Rex didn't disappear in the end. Instead, he joined Emmet and Lucy and lived with them in the newly rebuilt city of Syspocalypstar along with the rest of their friends.However, almost a year has passed, when everyone's working hard in preparing for the most prestigious holiday of the year, things have changed, but not for the better. The future that they have planned on building since the five-year long war isn't what they really hoped it to be. There are RELATIONSHIPS that need to endure through the test of time, a BIG MYSTERY that threatens the lives of every citizen in Syspocalypstar, and ONE particular factor when left unchecked could cause everything they know and love to crumble down!Rex Dangervest, Emmet Brickowski, Lucy a.k.a. Wyldstyle, and the rest of their friends will have to make sure that they all work side-by-side to secure their lives now, and their own futures together!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is literally my first LEGO fiction work, and my first ever novelized fiction work in my life in over more than 7 years! The actual ending of the LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part actually inspired me to write this alternate ending, mostly because I wanted Rex Dangervest to have an actual happy ending that he deserves!
> 
> But as soon as I continued critically pondering onto this possibility, I realized that there really is a story that's needed to be told here. With overwhelming inspiration overflowing within me, it drove me to pick up my writing skills I never thought I would ever do again, and went straight to conceptualizing, then eventually writing the story down.
> 
> While this is a LEGO-based fanfic, I actually based this story on how I draw the LEGO characters, which some have more anthropomorphic features, but the characters are still pretty universally aware of their LEGO nature (such as the concept of Master Builders, and other things).
> 
> And also, the way I release my chapters are by batches (e.g. a batch of chapters per release, rather than a newly finished chapter per release). I prefer this release schedule for those who prefer binge reading, yet at the same time, those who prefer reading fewer chapters per day can still enjoy themselves. This also means that it will take me longer periods of time to upload any updates of brand new chapters. However, it also ensures the quality of the story, so I hope all your patience will be worth it.
> 
> Hope you'll enjoy this story! =D

## 

## BLURB 

What if he never disappeared in the end?

What if he joined with his newfound friends?

What kind of life that would be for a villain who was given a second chance?

In this alternate ending, Rex Dangervest, who was lost in space for many years, was finally given the opportunity to change his life. Emmet and Lucy gave him the offer to join them, and he accepted, taking him into a life in the city of Syspocalypstar, which is as peaceful and joyous as can be. The condition couldn't be more perfect! For someone who's trying to reform from his past ways, the road seemed like a piece of cake!

However, real life doesn't work that way . . . It is never a smooth journey.

Such a decision Rex made, and such an offer Emmet and Lucy gave, led them to unforeseen circumstances in their lives and consequences they had to deal with that would seriously test their resolve; situations they all couldn't have ever possibly realized . . .

* * *

###  **CHAPTER 01**

“Good morning, Syspocalypstar!” taking a stroll on the city streets, holding a cup of coffee with his hand, he expressed a joyful greeting to the new city he is now living in. Being an energetic and happy young man, he’s always filled with infectious positivity, never holding back from sharing it with everybody. Passing by neighbor after neighbor, he said to them a greeting with a smile on his face: “Good morning neighbor! How’s your day?”

It’s of no wonder why he’s in such a pretty cheerful mood. Ever since Taco Tuesday, people lived in a state of terrorism and oppression. These are strong words, but it’s true! But after the events of Ar-ma-mageddon, there is every reason to express joy now that everyone is living in peace and harmony. What a life it has been, for five years of nothing but war and increasing destruction. Does everyone express the same joy he is experiencing right now? In his mind, there should be no doubt! But closely inspecting and judging on every neighbor’s face, it seems to be . . . on the contrary?

His greetings to them seemed to do nothing good. They all kept showing a serious face; coldly and bitterly staring at him, as if they’re holding a grudge against him. This is weird. These expressions are way too familiar. It’s nothing new, but it is definitely out of touch with what’s actually going on in front of their faces. Why is everyone being anything but happy like he is? The neighbors have nothing to say in return but just an eerie glare, so he could only say back to them: “Oookay? I’m just gonna ignore the fact you are all staring at me like that.”

Turning away from them, he caught sight of someone familiar that brought him some relief. It’s Lucy, with her colorful hair, standing nearby a garden pool, connected to the bay where the city’s landmark and icon is built in its center. She seemed to be facing the spectacular view, but she looked upset for some reason. Her arms are crossed, eyes shut, as if she’s really bothered about something on her mind. “Now this is definitely something I can’t ignore. What’s going on? Something wrong?” he asked with concern as he approached her from behind. She immediately replied with a disdained tone: “Try to guess.” Shocked to hear this, he flinched. What on earth could she possibly be upset about during this most joyous time of their lives? He has no idea what to say anything back. Such an ambiguous statement only left him expressing a “Huh?” Without any more hesitation, she turned around and openly said to him that could only further confuse him to the core:

> “You’re still being the same old Emmet we used to know.”

Crack! He felt within him a strike of pain the moment she uttered those words. She’s saying the same thing like when they were at war. He just could not understand this. Everything is behind them now. She’s supposed to be fine being who he is. Why is she bringing this up again? He couldn’t help anymore but noticed Lucy observing his blank response. What can he say? She looked disappointed, so she walked past by him, but not leaving him in the dust. She still has something to say.

“You haven’t changed with the times. What makes this so hard for you?”

He couldn’t help but turned to face her and said: “But Lucy . . . everything is awesome in Syspocalyps—” Abruptly, Lucy rigidly pointed to where he stands and lashed out: “NO Emmet! Everything is NOT awesome!”

He saw right from where his feet are standing, the grass withered! Startled to see this, he saw it spreading rapidly throughout his surroundings like an infection. The natural things, the beautiful flowers, the green scenery, just turned brown and dead! The garden pool behind him evaporated, leaving behind a dried, cracked soil. It spread to the distance, turning all the beautiful buildings as it merged with natural elements into something broken and destroyed. He couldn’t help but also notice the people somehow changed their appearances. Now their eerie glaring faces matched with their looks. They looked exactly like how they were during war times.

“Wha—What’s happening?!” he panicked, losing hold of his coffee, dropping it to the ground.

He couldn’t care anymore about that, for he could literally see Syspocalypstar suddenly became like Apocalypsburg all around him! Barren-like and deserted!

He slowly walked back in fear from what he is seeing. Accidentally bumping on Lucy, he turned back to face her. Once he did, he couldn’t believe what he saw. Her black hair, those worn out shades and scarf. She’s wearing the exact same gear when they were at war. It’s all back! She looked just like everybody else!

“Lucy?” he uttered in disbelief.

He couldn’t stop staring right at her eyes. He feared whatever she might say, but he needed to hear it from her.

“Lucy, what’s going on?”

She slowly walked to him, but in a dominating way. She expressed that same glare his neighbors did earlier. This is getting scary. Lucy has never acted like this to him. He slowly walked away from her to keep distance, pleading to her: “Lucy, please!”

> “Stop pretending to be someone you’re not supposed to be anymore! Things will never be the same for you,” she said this grimly.

He felt uneasy. He stopped to stand on his ground, trying to assert himself so Lucy would stop. He cried: “Why are you saying this? You don’t make any sense!”

“Let me put this simply then. You don’t belong here!”

“What?!”

He suddenly saw what’s coming for him. He saw everybody in the city approaching towards Lucy, rallying with her, forming a terrifying unison against him. He also saw his other friends with the crowd, Unikitty, Benny, Metalbeard, even Batman! He felt pressure in his chest at seeing such a sight. His breathing became heavy. Without anyone by his side, it’s stupid to fight against them, especially not knowing what’s making them act this way. They’re his friends!

“You’re becoming soft!” Batman exclaimed as he crossed his arms.

“Ye’ are not a grown-up man!” Metalbeard scornfully added.

“You’re not fit to be here!” even Unikitty joined with them.

He helplessly pleaded them in distress, “Everyone! Please! I don’t understand what you’re saying!” He refused to believe them. He just couldn’t! They’re not making any sense! He looked at Lucy, hoping to get an answer. Then she said something he thought she would never ever hear her say:

“You cannot be one of us. You’re a **nobody**!”

He snapped in complete disbelief, muttering: “This can’t be real . . .”

He saw Lucy grabbed her phone out, called somebody, and answered: “Eliminate him from our midst!” Without hesitation, he ran away! He ran away from them, from everybody as far as his own legs can take him!

* * *

“Wake up! Wake up!” He yelled at himself as he held onto his own head, shaking it.

He was running away from a threat he never thought could be possible. His friends are turning against him, with no warning! This must be a bad dream! There’s no way they could all suddenly act like traitors. But no matter how he tried to snap himself out of it, nothing’s happening. He’s still found himself running away for his life!

Suddenly, something exploded right in front of him, stopping him from his tracks. All his thoughts hang to a stop to notice a shadow casting over him from behind. He looked back to see a hovering spherical shaped spaceship. That looked way too familiar, and it’s no other! It’s General Mayhem’s ship! He saw it about to take fire. This is not the time to be paralyzed in fear, RUN!!

In a split of a second, it fired, barely hitting him! The explosion caused him to blast off to the farther side. His whole back felt seared, but he got up on his feet immediately and continued running. It’s the only thing he could do! To think he could quickly get something around and build himself some defenses, but for some reason he’s now right in the middle of a barren wasteland. There was literally nothing available and ready to build something out for protection. He couldn’t collect his thoughts to create a plan. He is on the run! He couldn’t afford to take risks!

The ship continued firing. Hitting near his left and right, dodging all the explosions. This is terrible! There were too many close calls. He’s extremely vulnerable! He could only run. This dire situation made it too easy to run out of fuel. Can’t risk to stop and look back! It’s foolish to even fight! Just run! Couldn’t care anymore wherever he’s headed. There’s no other way!

He unexpectedly started tripping, and before he knew it, he felt a sharp impact so close from his rear! The blast was extremely intense, he flew right off the ground and harshly crashed, bouncing and scraping against the rough, dusty, scorching ground. The pain was excruciating! He could barely move, but he needed to be strong.

Alas, what he saw ahead of him made him felt otherwise. He found himself facing a tall, rocky wall, stretching from both left and right as far as the eyes can see. It was like he was on the foot of the walls of the Grand Canyon. It also didn’t take any moment longer for him to notice the shadow of the ship casting on that wall.

Great! What has he gotten himself into? This looks like a checkmate!

Somehow, he was given a few moments to even struggle to get on his feet. He faced at the ship hovering right in front of him, so far, yet so near. He felt like losing hope. He could still run left or right. He tried to get a sensing of himself that there’s still a way out, but he’s slowly giving into trembling, uncontrollably. Fear was dominating him. He even lost the strength to talk and reason out with the general. But considering how the citizens just treated him, it all felt useless. Seeing what’s like his doom, he gulped and waited to what is sure to happen.

He saw it about to take fire. This instantly made his thoughts ran wild! What did he do to receive this treatment? This is unjustified! His fear suddenly turned to anger. He couldn’t help but feel his own fists clenching.

“Don’t . . . Don’t make me do this!” angered, he clenched his fist harder.

He’s losing control over himself. He so wanted to destroy that ship! Yes! Wrecks! WRECKS!! But wait, no! He couldn’t! He couldn’t fight someone he considers as his friend. But he couldn’t keep all these raging emotions that’s coming right out of him. He needed to punch! He needed to BREAK!

And thus, he snapped! As soon as he saw the ship charging for a fire, he snapped in reflex! He did something he swore he would never do again. In a flash of thought however, he felt it was all too strange that somehow, he swiftly diverted his attack to the other obstacle that was blocking his way, and not on her. Yelling to it, charging against it, he smashed it hard! It crumbled and blew off! It all felt like slow-motion. He broke the rocky wall and somehow passed through it. There revealed a hidden cavern!

Trying to process what just happened, he paused, stood on his feet. Eyes twitching as he felt his thoughts shut blank. He could only focus on what he could hear; the bits of smashed rocks falling to the ground, his own heavy panting, and the ship holding back its fire. He heard General Mayhem utter words from her ship in a deep manly voice: “Master Breaker?!” He turned to look at her through the windshield. She removed her helmet, revealing her face. Then in her real voice, she said in fear: “You are way more dangerous that I thought you were!”

That negative remark instantly made him feel the world just completely rejected him. It was hard to ignore it, he tried. But as soon as he looked upon his own two hands, what it just did solidified in his mind. Such an ability felt threatening. He started to believe that everyone was right all along. But wait! What he just did was definitely nothing compared to what they just did to him. He almost got killed! How dare his friends would even do such a thing?!

“Wait! No!” he immediately snapped himself out of his mind. “There’s no way my friends would ever do this to me!” Even he felt sure he was not making any sense, but he will not allow his own thoughts to spiral down further. He shook off that remark and everything that just happened, and continued running in the cavern. No one would follow him in here for sure.

All that running echoed loud in this silent underground tunnel. He has no idea where he was going, but he felt determined to run away from everybody. He continued running, not knowing when to stop. He soon found himself hearing his own feet running on steel, but he cared less. He just wanted to be alone. All that running finally made him run out of air. He stumbled to his knees on the metallic surface, gasping, trying to get a little rest. Maybe this place might be safe enough for now. He can finally take a breather. For a moment of silence in the darkness, it felt comforting, it felt secure, but this metallic floor started to feel way too familiar.

“This . . . this couldn’t be . . .” he gasped when the darkness was broken by subtle lights coming from the floor.

Then the walls. Then the ceiling.

Then finally, a letter “R” lit right above him.

This is unmistakably clear!

“The Rexcelsior!!” he exclaimed as he found himself right at the driving station of the ship.

He can see the space beyond the large windshields, the control panels, screens and all! Witnessing all of this just made him feel like he’s officially losing it. Not even a moment could pass by without noticing the driver’s seat just turned around to reveal someone was there, wearing a blue vest with that same letter. One leg crossed, and his head leaning on his wrist as he placed that arm on the armrest, staring at him with an evil-looking grin.

“. . . I don’t believe this! You’re—”

“Me.”

He finished that for him, for it was none other than Rex Dangervest!

* * *

Rex let out a manly chuckle as he stood up from his seat. He approached him and said: “Well, well, who’s this _‘somebody’_ that got in my ship?” He noticed Rex looking at him pity. He was worn out, tired and exhausted, even his own orange vest seemed dirty and damaged after everything he’s been through, like the rest of his outfit. Rex kneeled a leg down to his level, and lifted up his chin to him closely. He said this with a smirk: “You look hurt, confused, and abandoned . . . I know how you feel.”

“No . . . I’m not abandoned. I’m not!”

“Yeah sure! Go ahead! Carry on this bold pretense! It’s like it will do you any good.” Rex couldn’t accept he was trying to suppress the truth. He disappointingly left him behind on the floor and turned his back on him. He added: “Can you even hear yourself? You’re BEYOND stupid to even admit that!”

He groaned as he got up on his feet and insisted at Rex: “No . . . You’re wrong!” Now more than ever he needed to be strong. He is being confronted by someone who is clearly opposing him. Literally everyone is saying words not making any sense at this point. Then he heard Rex snickering at his statement. This is just irritating! Rex turned around to face him and blurted out: “And what? Ignore all what just happened to ya’?”

“What just happened was not what I meant!”

“Oh, I know what you meant!” Rex suddenly shifted to a serious note.

This confused him. How can he possibly admit he actually knows? Then he noticed Rex showing that same glaring expression he has been seeing recently. He won’t give in to fear this time. He’ll stare just as serious as he is to him. Not for long, Rex starts circling around him in a slow pace. He’s anticipating Rex to say something. Like that’s anything new.

“Pretending that everything’s awesome and nothing’s going on can only take you so far, _‘me’_. Although, I have to admit, I can see what you’re doing is so . . . Emmet-like, but I can also see you’re not really moving on.” He continued listening attentively to Rex speaking. “We both know you’ve been in my shoes telling someone who was just as clueless as you. But tonight’s not the same . . .” Rex suddenly held onto his shoulder like some friend before saying this: “Because you know! Heheh! You know EXACTLY what I’ve been through!” This widened his eyes. He’s starting to realize where Rex is really headed.

“All those years alone, stranded, forgotten, miserably rotting in the Planet Undar of the Dryar System! You know it all too well like it was yesterday. No one came back for ‘ya. No one even bothered to care. They grew up disliking you the way you were.”

Rex taunted him as he circled around, noticing him slowly breaking eye contact with him. Rex’s statements were really getting into his head because he’s starting to go somewhere that actually made sense to him. He felt Rex grabbed him by his arms from behind, and spoke right beside his ear:

> “You were once a nobody, but after all that insufferable pain, you became somebody. You were proud.”

Rex could closely see that he’s slowly expressing madness. He also noticed he refused to make eye contact with him, so he went right in front of him, face to face, to ask him this question:

“How does it make you feel . . . when you see them despising you for the same reason they casted you off when you refused to change?”

The moment that question was raised, he snapped! He pushed Rex away and yelled: “Get away from me! This is the reason why I will never be a man like you!”

Rex burst out laughing when he heard this. He was not intimidated by him asserting himself. In fact, he mocked him! “Dude! Listen to yourself! You can’t be this ignorant! You know what’s like to be so angry in the world. You still hate everything that’s lame. And no matter how many times you say it . . . you will never EVER live up to your own invented phrase . . . ‘cause you got so much of ‘em!” Rex showed a dominating grin right at him. He wanted him to admit whatever he said to be the truth, and it felt it did. The latter he said tugged his heartstrings. He couldn’t fight Rex’s statements when he knew he was right. He did remember the time he was abandoned. He did become resentful. He fully knew what it was like to live a life burdened with regrets.

> “So, no matter how hard you try to change now, I am still a part of you, and I always will be.”

What Rex said here was the most devastating. He gave up fighting him. He couldn’t even look at him in the face. He painfully expressed a heavy sigh when he said to him: “Then . . . I really am a nobody but . . . a bad guy?”

Rex snapped his fingers, causing the floor they’re standing on to violently divide. The quake made him fall to his knees. He held onto the floor for support. Once things calmed a little, he looked down beyond the cracked surface, and gazed upon the broken metal tiles falling down to something he saw that brought back terrifying memories. He saw the Bin of Storah-ghe sucking everything nearby. He saw the ruined Syspocalypstar crumbled into pieces and gone right into the darkness. He saw all of his friends disappearing into the void. He saw Lucy falling down with no one left to save her; all the while hearing everyone screaming for their lives. Seeing this horrific sight caused him to break!

“No! My friends . . . Th-They never deserved this!” he whimpered.

“You never came back to save your _‘friends’_. You came back to teach them a lesson.” Rex, suddenly with his spacesuit on, said this to remind him, but he had enough of Rex talking sense. “SHUT UP! This is all in the past! Things have changed!!” he grieved in despair, clenching against his own hair. Then Rex said: “It will always get the best of you, even when you are in the present . . . ‘cause you’re **trapped** in your own mind,” slowly uttering the latter. Completely bewildered by his statement, he stared right back at Rex for a solid moment, but Rex won’t stay any longer to chat. He activated his jetpack and said this before he left him for good:

“Looks like you need a lesson for yourself. This is for you, brother.”

“NO WAIT!!”

Rex blasted off into space, leaving him. Slowly, the whole Rexcelsior was overcome by the powerful gravity of the black hole below them. It was too strong; the ship became unstable. It slowly broke apart into pieces. There was no more he could hold onto, so he fell into the abyss along with It, screaming for his life.

Rex snapped from his nightmare when he harshly fell on the bedroom floor. He was fidgeting so much during it all; he got entangled with his star-printed fleece blanket and fell with it. The crash startled him. In complete shock, he struggled in panic to free himself, ignoring the pain from his head and back. He got up dizzy only to be tripped over by a footstool and fell head-on to the floor.

Next thing he knew, he was laying against the cabinet as he sat on the floor. The room was dim with a soft blue tint. He designed his room like that for comfort, but the nightmare he just had was still too vivid. It was all he could think about. He distressfully let his head fall onto his clenching palms, and gave out a very heavy sigh. He could still feel all those intense emotions. All this was just completely draining to him. For several nights, this is how he woke himself into. At this point, it was all starting to become unbearably infuriating. He gripped hard on his short bangs, forcefully pulling it out of pent-up anger, and banged his head hard onto the cabinet.

“ARGH! What is wrong with me?! I just wanna have a good nap in here!” He yelled and groaned and moped. He has no idea how to end this agony. He’s too tired and exhausted to even figure out anything. He couldn’t care less if he dosed off on the floor like this. Little did he know, his banging caused something to fall right onto his head. A sharp burst of pain for sure! Again! Hissing, he buckled up, rubbing his head. He swore in his mind if anything else happens, he’ll tick and explode!

What fell on his head was actually a digital clock shaped like a raptor. The second passed by, the clock stroke six, and the alarm ticked off. It could only sound so annoying. Rex banged on the switch to shut it. Then saying this after a heavy groan: “Good morning, Syspocalypstar . . . “

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it for the first chapter! =D
> 
> It's a quite big chapter to start off, I know! xD  
Were you able to catch up with the twist? x3  
I have been hiding this chapter so tightly from public since July, I have been DYING to really get to know your thoughts about all this angst! There's gonna be plenty where that's coming from with the following chapters, so I hope you'll enjoy this one heck of a LEGO fic ride!
> 
> Oh, I also want to say that originally I was gonna upload 11 chapters for the first batch, but looks like you'll be getting an extra chapter too!  
12 chapters to binge read, if you enjoy binge reading! ^w^
> 
> Next chapter, we will be focusing on what's happening in the real world, with Emmet and Lucy, and what are they up to. It'll be another big chapter like this one, with plenty of stuff to reveal~


	2. Chapter 2

###  **CHAPTER 02**

Another new day has indeed arrived in this beautiful city of Syspocalypstar; a huge city that combines architecture, natural elements and themes of the old world and the entire Systar System. It was built to unite these two worlds in peace, and it deserved so. After years of warring against one another, it is of no doubt that its inhabitants today are awaiting its most anticipated day of the year. Its first anniversary! Yes! Almost a year has passed when this story begins. The citizens have already occupied themselves in preparing for the grand ceremony that its ruler, Queen Watevra Wana’bi, has planned from the beginning. She has always desired to celebrate its anniversary ever since its founding. Being a party person and planner herself, she has plenty of ideas hoping to be done, but the scope of this work was a little too much to handle all by her own. She knew she needed help.

“. . . That’s why I chose you Emmet, to move the project forward as my head supervisor of all preparations. As an experienced construction worker, you have all the means necessary to follow my instructions on how to make this special party a success! If this whole ordeal seems too much for you, you know you have nothing to worry about. You have friends! Plus, you will also be recognized as having official authority by wearing this badge you will be given shortly. I chose you for the same reason you were chosen as the special, Emmet. Do it for all Syspocalypstar stands for. You can do it!” the queen’s female Duplo messenger read the letter aloud in front of him. This was the first thing the queen wanted Emmet to do when morning came. He was called to the castle, and receive this message. This assignment was given to him in such an abrupt manner, Emmet didn’t know how to respond.

“The queen needs . . . me?” Emmet hesitated.

“Don’t worry Emmet! Like the queen said, we all got your backs!” he heard Unikitty as she approached him cheerfully when she entered the throne room.

She is one of Emmet’s closest friend who is very supportive and carefree, always trying her best to stick to positivity. In that moment, she is fully aware that he needed it too.

“Unikitty’s right,” Lucy added, for she too was with her. She continued: “The people are getting their heads right into it! Although the celebration won’t start until next week, there’s still lots of work left that needs to be done.” Now, Lucy has a special relationship with Emmet. They call each other ‘special-best-friends’ for a reason. Because of this, Lucy’s always ready to be there for Emmet when he needed comfort and reassurance. Hence, when she reached by his side, she gently placed her hand upon his shoulder and asked him consolingly: “Are you ready to do this, Emmet?” He was somewhat perplexed by this sudden support system, as much as so with this responsibility he was suddenly asked for. It was only until today he was aware about all of this.

“You knew about this Lucy?” Emmet wondered. “Yeah,” Lucy replied with a hint of guilt, “Before Watevra left space again to check on the New Systar System, Sweet gave me a heads-up,” she explained, mentioning her other friend as well, who was the queen’s right hand general. “And you never bothered giving me a heads-up too?” he complained. Emmet and Lucy have already been living together in the same house. It seemed sensible for him to raise this complaint, so Lucy further explained: “I knew the queen wanted to tell this to you personally, but you weren’t around to see her last night, so she wrote this letter for you.”

“So . . . what now?” asked Emmet, then turning to the messenger, “Do you have the instructions with you?” She immediately handed over the pad where the instructions are written down, and the badge attached on its front cover that seemed to shape like the queen’s royal crown. Emmet sifted through the pages. There weren’t a lot of words on it, but mostly colored drawings to illustrate the instructions. This filled the pad a lot more pages that it should actually be, making him feel his assignment looked a little huge and daunting.

“I have no experience with putting up parties, but it looks like we actually have what we need. Look! She even wrote down some ‘Do’s and Don’ts’,” said Emmet, showing Lucy a smile, but deep down he was actually a little nervous. There’s no fooling Lucy though. She could see that through his eyes. She always has been a perceptive kind of person. “Don’t worry, Ems,” she initiated, “this is really just a check-up duty and nothing more! You’re not gonna give an eloquent speech in front of complete strangers, or make a plan to save the universe. We’ve got this!” She wanted him to be reassured that he’s not alone in this, and she saw that he got her point.

When Emmet was sifting through the pages earlier, Unikitty was able to glance at a page and saw her assignment the queen gave her. She then expressed her excitement to Emmet, reciting what she saw: “‘Party preparations to-do-list: Number five, decorations!’ If you’re on the mood to check it out, we can start off with that! There’s much to see! Need a hint? Imagine the colors of the rainbow.”

“Rainbows? That sounds awesome!” Emmet energetically commended her, and then abruptly dropping that energetic tone and continued: “But Unikitty, we really should start with what’s number one on this list.” She was a little disappointed by Emmet’s exacting attitude to stick to order, so she expressed her disappointment jokingly, shaking her head, “Emmet . . . same old Emmet . . . you never changed.” Lucy giggled at Unikitty’s response. They all knew Emmet wouldn’t budge from following instructions, but Lucy couldn’t love him more for that.

> “That’s our Emmet alright! He’s perfect the way he is!” said Lucy with joy while playfully pinching his baby cheek.

Emmet felt a little embarrassed by her pinching, but he just went along with it. He actually likes Lucy treating him like some adorable grown-up-man baby. It felt very endearing. Then out of the blue, the messenger uttered: “He’s baby,” causing a shock that the three just had to immediately look back at her in confusion. They completely forgot she was present this whole time, and has overheard their conversation. She clarified with glee: “What? We all love Emmet!”

A lot can happen when time goes by. Emmet used to be treated nothing more than just another somebody, if ‘nobody’ was harsh enough. Now, things have changed somehow. He wasn’t able to catch up with the changing reception, so he couldn’t help at all but blush full red now because of all this flattering treatment.

“Okay, okay, enough with all this cutesy thing and let’s get on with this,” Emmet awkwardly chuckled when he stated that, flipping the pad in the air. He then removed the badge from it, and pinned it on his construction vest. The girls knew that was the signal. They looked at the wall clock nearby and saw it was almost nine by now. It’s time to leave the throne room.

* * *

The palace doors opened wide for Emmet, Lucy, and Unikitty. They went out from the palace building and found themselves in the front castle gardens. Taking in the wonderful sensation of the spring atmosphere, Emmet instantly felt good inside. Ever since he woke up this morning, he has been bothered about something in particular, but now he felt that things will hopefully go right. “Just be positive Emmet, you can do this!” he motivated himself. He then turned to his friends with a bright smile and a determined face, and said: “Alright everyone, this is going to be an awesome day! There’s still so much work that needs to be done, so what do you say we make this happen?” His friends couldn’t agree more, especially Lucy. “I was wondering where all that confidence went off to,” she teased him. “I just needed some fresh air. That’s all!” Emmet smirked at her teasing. With no further ado, they headed right out of the palace borders and into the city.

Objective number one assigned them to head onto a particular area within Syspocalypstar. As they walked by, they would say: “Good morning!” to whomever they meet. Those whom they greeted, being fully aware of the ceremony that’s gonna take place, did the same out of joy. It has become a custom in Syspocalypstar to greet the neighbors; a necessary one that helped the citizens maintain peace and harmony with each other in little ways. A custom adopted from those who used to inhabit Bricksburg from the old world, but then later integrated more deeply into the purpose of why this city they’re living on today was built in the first place. All the more reason why the upcoming anniversary is such a very important event for everyone.

Soon enough, they reached the city bay, where the landmark of the city can be seen in the middle. On one of the banks, they came across a pirate ship moored to the dock, and they saw Metalbeard aboard. “Ahoy, mateys!” He greeted them loud and clear. He’s also one of Emmet’s friends, who had been with him in his past adventures. Since things have been pretty laid back throughout the year, he’s simply doing his own business with his crew now. Unusually, he actually saw Emmet earlier and was baffled about it. He said to him: “Saw ya’ passed by in a hurry lad, with no greetin’s.” Knowing the cheerful Emmet he is for many years, it was not like him to not utter a joyful greeting. Emmet could not stay and chat for long though. They had to go somewhere. He could only quickly reply: “Sorry Metalbeard. I had to rush to the castle. Just don’t forget about meeting us later at noon!” Metalbeard nodded to it and sent them their pirate goodbye till later.

They also passed by another friend’s place. His name is Benny, the astronaut. He was occupied building spaceship parts with his space siblings. He gave them a good morning and also reminded him the same thing he told Metalbeard earlier, for Benny was invited too.

“It has been a while since we all got together for a good time,” Lucy said to Emmet with a smile. To this, Unikitty added: “I’m glad you also invited me, Emmet. This is going to be fun! And . . . apparently, I also needed a little break too. I mean, I was supposed to be focused on building some glittering star décor to hang all around the city with my friends in the Glitter Infinity,” which referred to the Unikitty-shaped castle Queen Watevra gave her after her wedding as a promise. “Do you have any idea how many we have made by now? So far, we only made two hundred! That’s still not plenty. Not to mention, we still have other designs and ideas to take care of this final week. Thankfully, many came to help! We knew we had to sort out divisions and teams for it all,” Unikitty continued explaining. Hearing all of this made Emmet feel a little burdened knowing there was an increasing need to assist in her department. He had to interfere her blabbering further, and nudge the conversation back to the invitations earlier.

“It’s no problem, Unikitty! It’s only gonna take just a little bit of your time. Who doesn’t appreciate being invited for lunch?” Emmet stated a point.

Lucy interrupted and said to him concerningly: “You sure are trying hard to make this lunch time happen. We’re kinda in a pickle here, Emmet. Are you sure we still have time to entertain guests now that you have a big important duty thanks to the queen? This may keep you occupied, now that I think about it.”

“I’ll just take an early break. Don’t worry! Just probably gonna check two things on this list, and then we’ll go home to prepare. Right after lunch, we can all get back to our duties. Easy peasy lemon squeezy!” He reassured her, but hearing this made Unikitty a little disappointed. “Aw . . . you’re not gonna check out the decorations anytime soon? We really need some thoughts about it before we move on,” she complained. “Sorry Unikitty. Can the team wait a little longer? I really wanna set this thing up while there’s still time. I bet everyone’s gonna become too preoccupied anytime soon. There might not be any more left to spare!” he explained frantically.

It didn’t take any longer for Lucy to notice Emmet instantly went back to feeling insecure. She’s starting to sense something odd. Emmet usually gets giddy and excited when there is a gathering, not this . . . agitated. It’s like the responsibilities are getting on his head. She began to feel anxious about him, and rushed to his side and said: “Emmet, I just wanna make sure you’re not losing sight of what you’re doing out here.”

“I know, I know,” he swiftly replied, shutting his eyes tight. He stopped walking and stood completely still. This caused the two to stop with him. He hesitated to look back at Lucy, but the conversation was leading to a point where he couldn’t keep something from them any longer. He took a deep, calming breath before saying this: “I just wanna make sure this plan we spend time with our friends actually goes on, you know? It’s kind of . . . important too.”

“Why is this so important?” asked Lucy.

“I just . . . kinda . . .” Emmet kept hesitating to explain, scratching his head. This only made her and Unikitty listen even more attentively. Emmet could no longer deny that it was time to give them answers. “. . . I actually wanna make this sort of a surprise. But I dunno how you guys would really take it, either way if it is a surprise or not,” he continued with his head down, fidgeting with his fingers.

“Oh, I love surprises! There’s gonna be confetti blow-off while we eat, right?” Unikitty anticipatedly asked. “No, nothing like that . . . but that does sound funny,” Emmet chuckled a little to Unikitty’s suggestion. Surprising her, he said with a wink: “I’ll consider that, Unikitty.” This caused her to let out a big “Yaay!!” with sparkles emitting right out of her.

“But really,” Emmet continued, “it’s not a big, over the top kind of a surprise, nor it is a good one, I think. It’s just . . .” he hesitated again.

“What?” Lucy asked again, seeing Emmet struggling to spit it out.

“It’s . . . It’s just . . . It’s been a really long while . . . since . . . he hanged out with any of us . . . I just wanna make sure he’s not . . . left behind. You know?” Emmet continued, showing more and more nervousness on his face.

“Who?” Lucy raised her eyebrows.

“. . . I invited Rex in this.”

Lucy and Unikitty was instantly shocked by that response! It was like an exclamation point appeared right above their own head! Emmet was really hoping for an entirely different reaction, holding onto his big and wide, awkward grin in front of their faces.

“REX?!” Lucy cleared her throat before proceeding with an awkward smile, “He’s gonna be with us for lunch?” Emmet was quite disheartened with that kind of tone, and sadly stated: “I was literally wishing in my head you wouldn’t sound like that guys . . . and I can still see those exclamation marks right above you, you know?” The two immediately slapped it far away from them!

“Why didn’t you warn me he’ll come? You didn’t let anyone else know about this, did you?” Lucy was clearly concerned about this.

“It was supposed to be a surprise, Lucy!” Emmet answered back, feeling a little upset.

“You shouldn’t have kept that as a surprise for us,” Unikitty disappointingly suggested him, which Lucy supported, speaking to Emmet in the kindest tone she can possibly make it: “Yeah, Emmet. Unikitty and the rest of the gang could have mentally prepared.”

“It’s that, or you guys probably wouldn’t have bothered responding to the invitation!” Emmet, with anger slowly boiling up within him, used the pad he’s holding to point both at them individually. This heavily offended Lucy.

“I don’t have to respond to your invitation Emmet. I live with you!” she lost her cool and raised her voice. Emmet wasn’t intimidated by her tone at all. He just slapped his own face.

Tension immediately rose up from between them. Lucy sensed it, he sensed it too, and Unikitty felt bothered why they were suddenly arguing about this. It didn’t take long for Emmet to feel embarrassed by pointing at them like that, so he refused to say any word, holding onto that facepalm. Silence brewed for a moment. It felt awkward. Someone has to start saying something. Lucy took a careful look at Emmet. He was still hiding his face behind his palm though. She then faced at Unikitty, who was nudging her to talk to him. It already felt disrespectful to even resist, so she gave out a sigh, and walked up close to him and tried to apologize.

“Look, Emmet—”

“I know, Lucy. It’s my fault. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that, especially to you,” Emmet didn’t want Lucy to apologize, but she needed to.

“I’m sorry too Emmet. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“You don’t have to feel sorry, Lucy,” he looked straight at her, before letting his head fall down in shame. “I was the one who started it. I felt tensed. I only made you worry.” Lucy slowly began to understand what’s really bothering him. He was stressed out. Yet, it felt a little peculiar he became stressed this early in the job. But she couldn’t spend time any longer to guess. He needed comfort, so she went to his side and softly rubbed on his back to comfort him.

“Is it because of the huge responsibility the queen gave you?”

This was a question Emmet find it hard to logically answer. He had been feeling distressed about things ever since he woke up this morning. Lucy and Unikitty now knew Emmet was nervous all along about how others would react if Rex came with them for lunch, but he needed to make it happen for some reason. And now he was given a huge responsibility that could interfere with his plans for noontime. Lots were going on in his mind. He only replied to Lucy’s question: “I guess so.”

Unikitty couldn’t linger on any longer and went to him, with droopy ears, to apologize too. “Emmet, if it helps, I’ll let my team wait for you to come and check on us. I won’t bother you about this anymore until it’s time.” He felt a little better when Unikitty allowed herself to lift some burden from him, so he smiled and said to her: “Thank you,” in relief.

“At least we’re still gonna have a good time in your place soon. It’s gonna help you cheer up and destress!” Unikitty added with cheer, wanting Emmet to cheer up the same way, but then what happened? Emmet instantly went back to being unsettled all over again! He did not want another outburst, so he needed to pretend he’s alright. He turned his back on them and started heading on saying: “Yeah, sure. I think we’ve lost track of time. We should get going.” This was all too undeniable to the girls, glancing at each other with concerned faces. There’s no guessing it. Emmet really needed help settling his priorities straight!

Lucy ran to him and reasoned out: “Emmet, you don’t have to do this for all of us so soon! If this get-together is just that important to you, then please, consider postponing it ‘til dinner time. It’s more convenient for everyone, and less stressful for you.” Lucy did made sense, but Emmet couldn’t help but worry everyone might be a little too tired to come for dinner after working all day. He was not sure how to respond. He only stared at her in doubt.

“I’m sure our friends will come for dinner,” she added, “After all, who can’t deny free food when everyone’s spent and hungry? I’m sure I can’t, right Unikitty?” Lucy needed Unikitty’s approval to merit her suggestion, so Emmet would be inclined to change his mind.

“Uhh . . . yes! Yes of course!” Unikitty replied in agreement, expressing truthfully as she can muster, showing a big happy grin.

Thankfully, they didn’t have to wait long enough to hear Emmet make a decision, but he said this unenthusiastically: “. . . Okay. Dinner it is.”

“And Emmet . . .” Lucy suddenly continued, “there’s one more thing I want you to consider. You really need to tell everyone that Rex is gonna be there. Don’t worry about it! They will still come. I hate to see them expressing the same thing we did back there. Let’s keep this dinner time all well and good. Okay?” Lucy was really sure that Emmet has something he’s gonna say after this, but as she hoped, he nodded silently to her consideration. That was good.

* * *

Emmet and the girls are still on their way to their destination, but right now things have become quiet between them. Emmet has just finished sending everyone who’s invited a text that there has been a change of plans. Now he was walking ahead of them, reading what’s written in the pad more thoroughly, while Lucy and Unikitty followed him a little farther behind.

“I didn’t want Emmet to feel bad after all that,” whispered Unikitty to Lucy, “but I admit I am concerned about having dinner at your place now.” Lucy replied: “I am too, now that Rex is actually joining with us. To think I actually have something exciting I wanna show you guys later at home. Now I have to be more careful than ever!”

“Is this about . . . what you wrote—”

Lucy immediately hushed Unikitty down before she can finish. Then with a hint of smile on her face, she whispered back to her: “Let’s not talk about this yet, not with Emmet right in front of us!”

> “Oh Wyldstyle, you and your secrets,” Unikitty teased, uttering Lucy’s other nickname.

“It’s not a secret! It’s a surprise! A good surprise! Something he’ll really love, I’m sure,” defended Lucy, yet, a little dreamy eyed, as she stared at Emmet while he’s walking ahead of them. “Alright, let’s end this before it gets out of hand,” Unikitty teased some more, which Lucy scoffed, but agreed nonetheless.

“Speaking of surprises,” Unikitty added, “I am somewhat surprised you didn’t include Rex in our little bandwagon for Emmet’s special surprise. He’s Rex’s closest friend after all. I’m sure he’d love to give support.” Unikitty actually stated a profoundly reasonable issue, but Lucy replied, slowly turning into a sad note: “That’s . . . hard to explain, Unikitty. I’m afraid . . . it’s not gonna be that simple.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be . . . one of Rex’s closest friend too?” Unikitty reminded her, something that she actually had observed throughout the passing year. Lucy gave out a heavy sigh before explaining why. This was something she hoped she’d never talk about, but she knew it needed an outlet one day, only if she can find someone she can trust with this information she’s about to share. “It has been some few months now since I’ve decided to limit my contact with him. I have my reasons, but . . . for now, I can only tell you this part of the whole story. Promise me you won’t tell anyone?” Lucy pleaded her. “Now Wyldstyle, this time I am serious. You’re keeping a secret from Emmet,” Unikitty deliberately said, somewhat with a hint of dismay.

“No I’m not!” she replied sternly, but with guilt.

“You know how Emmet feels when you keep secrets!” Unikitty couldn’t be more disappointed. She needed to stare right at her disapprovingly to take her stand, but Lucy decided not to budge and give in. She had her own reasons she could use to explain. She admitted: “You’re right, Unikitty. I may be keeping something from him, but . . .” she sighed deeply, trying her best to collect her thoughts and give out the best possible way to reason with her, “sometimes . . . there are things that are really needed to be kept confidential, and . . . maybe sometimes it’s for the better, especially if Emmet might misinterpret it and he won’t understand.” Unikitty gave it a little bit of thought. Not long enough, Lucy added to finish her reasoning: “When the time comes, I’ll tell Emmet how I feel about Rex . . . Just not now.”

“I understand,” Unikitty soon agreed, “I can only hope there’s something good that’s gonna come out of this.” Lucy gave out another heavy sigh before answering her, “I’m not sure if this is even something good. It may sound silly, but . . . I have been concerned about Emmet associating with Rex.”

“What do you mean?”

“As you have already known, Emmet and I have placed ourselves responsibility over him. We agreed to help Rex settle in to live with us, to help him have a place to stay after being lost in space for many years. Emmet is my inspiration, Unikitty. I really, really adore his kind spirit . . . but at the same time, his kindness to Rex is what I am concerned of. You might have not noticed it, but ever since he’s been part of our lives, I can see his attitude rubbing off on him sometimes . . . I still did not like how Emmet sounded back there.”

To where this conversation is going, Unikitty suddenly felt a weird tingle in her spine, like her fur could rise up, but she immediately shook it off. “You might be overthinking it, Wyldstyle. Emmet’s a good guy! He’s well-intentioned. He’s surrounded with very supporting friends! Good people who are loyal! Although, I still can’t forget the fact we haven’t been treating him very well during the war, but times are great now! Everyone’s happy! There’s an anniversary to get to. There’s literally nothing to be worried about!”

“Well . . . except that,” Lucy pointed to something they all eventually saw at the distance. Readers, they have finally arrived at their destination, but what they saw was something that’s definitely more intriguing than what they have been conversing about so far. It was a situation of needed serious concern to the whole inhabitants of the city. A busy and populated hectare of Syspocalypstar that experienced major structural damage due to a sinkhole. “Everyone . . . there is a big reason why the queen bothered putting ‘disaster relief and repair’ as number one in the list,” Emmet said as they gazed upon the view they could describe as ‘traumatic’. The sinkhole was only some few meters deep, but it was deep enough to damage streets and site developments. Buildings crumbled along with their foundations. It was complete destruction. Emmet could recognize many of those present in the site were his co-workers from Bricksburg working on repairing this portion of the city right to its former glory, but Emmet couldn’t help feel his heart pounding on seeing such a scope that’s needed to be taken care of before the day of the anniversary arrives. “I hope we can make this right in time just for this one section of the entire list,” Emmet said with dread.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phooey! That was one heck of a chapter!
> 
> This was honestly one of the more difficult chapters to write, mostly because I had so many ideas on how to start off the story, and I had problems trying to put these scenes into rhythm. So far, this is the best version I could write, and I am very satisfied with its flow and information reveal. I hoped you enjoy this chapter as much as the previous one. ^w^
> 
> I would really love to hear your thoughts about it, even if you do binge reading~ =D
> 
> Next chapter . . . will actually be a big breather 'cause it's a much shorter chapter, focusing on what's going on with Rex. =)


	3. Chapter 3

###  **CHAPTER 03**

Detached from what’s been happening out there in the city, Rex Dangervest is still in his own home, just getting ready to start the day. This alone was already unusual for him, and wasn’t liking it one bit. It certainly is in his personality to be an early morning person. Just like Emmet, he is pretty structured with his routine and prefers to stick to it. Unfortunately, he was still in his pajamas though, and it’s already late in the morning. He yawned and stretched as he reached out for his Rex-vest attire hanged in his cabinet. He definitely needed to get changed by now. He took a moment to glance at his raptor clock, and was shocked to realize the time, he had to stare right back at it the second he looked away.

“Oh shoot! Two hours left before twelve?! Ugh . . . Why did it have to be lunch, Emmet?!” he groaned disappointingly when he just remembered about the appointment he was invited to. He shouldn’t have slacked off back to bed after waking up the moment the raptor clock sounded the alarm . . . but he couldn’t help it. He had a terrible sleep that night. His own soft bedsheet and those comfy pillows were too tempting to resist. Looking at it now, it still is pretty tempting. He then yawned contagiously and whimpered discontentedly because of it.

“Ugghh . . . I need coffee!” he whammed the bedroom door, moving out, bringing with him his casual attire on the hanger.

Rex was too disoriented to really notice his surroundings as of the moment. He simply needed to head right to the kitchen, pronto! And so he did. He walked, and walked, albeit slightly out of good posture. He yawned some more, rubbing his eyes in the process. To think his extended sleep could have benefited him, but it was just a heck of a waste of time. He was too bothered to really look around where he was going, apparently. Is he even worried he might accidentally bump onto something? Nah! Rex had a spacious home! He had to cover a lot of ground just to reach the kitchen though. Living in the Rexcelsior was just like this. To Rex, this was no biggie.

As soon as he got into the kitchen, he flinched when he suddenly heard a roar right in front of him. He nearly bumped onto one of his trained raptors, to think he might have actually done it.

“Connar?!” Rex recognized his raptor in an instant, and was startled. He looked to notice it was holding a cup of coffee, which Connar held it closer to him. “For . . . for me?” Rex hesitated. He took a closer look at the mug Connar was holding by its handle, and saw it was his personal mug, colored navy blue with the illustration _‘Rex loves vest’_ printed on it. Seeing that this coffee was meant for him, he threw the hanged clothes onto the counter aisle and accepted the mug from Connar by grabbing it with his two hands.

“Ouch! Ouch!”

His sense of awareness wasn’t yet too snappy to realize that he forgot he wasn’t wearing his thick, blue gloves that usually protected him from touching something that’s hot. Thankfully, he didn’t drop it. That would have been a dud. He immediately held onto the handle, and gazed upon the coffee liquid. It looked black, and it smelled strong. Definitely it was black coffee; his preference for this morning.

“You never bothered giving me coffee before. That’s supposed to be the Other One’s thing. Where is he?” asked Rex, which Connar replied him with another roar.

“He’s still with Emmet, huh?” he chuckled a bit when he realized something, “After months of training, he finally got himself his own. Those two belonged together. They were always kind of soft.” There was a little hint of mockery with that tone. Then Rex took a sip of his hot, steamy coffee, and he finally felt some measure of pleasure in the morning. Black coffee is indeed strong compared to the sweetened one, but Rex eventually got used to it over time back in his space days. It still brought him delight until now. His temper began cooling down from the day’s bad start, and felt like complimenting. “Hmmm, it’s a great mix! This is nice of you . . . Thanks, Connar,” Rex said with a smile. It was a kind smile, sounded with genuine gratitude. This caused his smile to look similar to how Emmet smiles when he feels happy. Connar could see it and compare it. It roared back at Rex, which he suddenly irked. Why?

His roar actually meant, _“Lol, you sounded pathetically soft.”_

“Shut up.” Rex withdrawn that face, and replaced it with an expression of annoyance.

Rex doesn’t actually compliment kindly. He tends to sound and look tough when doing so. That’s who he is, or rather was . . . or is he still? It felt lame that he noticed that kind of change in himself. He couldn’t help it. This instantly made him remember what he just dreamt that night, about what Rex from his dream said to him. His Rex personality was indeed a part of him, and he still had it until now, even when about a year had already passed with Emmet being his closest associate. As long as he’s no longer doing bad things, like causing another Ar-ma-mageddon, or anything like that, he should be good right? Everything will just be great and awesome, right?

Connar could observe that Rex’s annoyed expression faded away as he went deep in thought. He was still facing his raptor, but his eyes were gazing elsewhere. He slowly drifted his attention to the wide glass curtain wall beside them, where he could see the overlooking view. He faced upon the city of Syspocalypstar, seeing it from the mountains. He had the whole 180° cityscape view. The tall buildings could partially cover the bay in front of it all, but not the landmark that’s built in its center. He can still see the head of the Statue of Liberty from here, facing the endless, blue sea. It was quite a breathtaking view. Rex had definitely chosen a great lot to build his home, but all he actually felt at the moment was . . . nothing . . . This again wasn’t the norm. Maybe he got used to seeing it after so many months? Could there be some other reasons he could not yet fully perceive? Whatever it may be, he only felt emptiness inside when he saw the view. He eventually became droopy . . .

And then he snapped out of it.

“Connar, get my mixtape ready for the gym . . . I need to clear my head.” Rex commanded, hiding his emotions, and Connar went off to do what he was told. Rex then pressed a switch to automatically bring a wide panel down, covering the whole glass wall of his kitchen and dining area. It appeared he didn’t want to see that view any longer. A year ago, when the city was first built, he made sure he had this view easily accessible at home, so he would still feel like he belonged there, even when he lived some miles away . . . But that’s not what he actually felt now for some reason.

Before the panel could fully cover the view though, he somehow spotted a part of the city where it seemed there was a huge collapse. That immediately caught his attention. He pressed the switch again to bring up the panel a little bit, and carefully looked at that area. He could tell it was still relatively new. He’s way too familiar with the cityscape by now. What could have possibly happened there? As much as he wanted to go downtown and investigate . . . he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. Something deep down was certainly keeping him from wanting to step into the city. It’s like he’s afraid for some reason. At least that’s how he perceived his own emotions at the moment. He pressed the button once more to completely shut the glass wall. He needed to remove some triggers that might swell up his emotions. That nightmare earlier already helped a lot. He really needed a distraction.

Then Ripley, another one of Rex’s trained raptors, suddenly came barging in. It was bringing Rex’s phone, for it noticed it had a new message. Rex checked it and read about the gathering that it changed plans to dinner instead of lunch. That puzzled him a little, but that change actually brought him a lot of relief somehow. He now had the entire day to himself. “No wonder I never noticed it. It’s in silent mode,” Rex realized. He was inclining to turn back the notification sound on . . . but he changed his mind. He placed his phone down on the counter, and sipped his coffee after not doing so for a while. The strong coffee taste perked his mood up a bit, and then he said to Ripley with a grin: “Can ya’ look after the rest of the raptors at the park? It looks like I may need some time solo. Just be sure you remember that drill. After what just happened down there, I don’t want ya’ all losing yourselves.” Ripley roared in agreement. Rex had to train his raptors to be ready for anything when such an unexpected event, like what’s been happening recently, might occur at any time. They had to keep alert.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There we go!  
A short little chapter break after two huge chapters you guys had to go through. =)  
Some milder chapter before you guys are going to get through another big one coming up next! A very exciting one, yes! =D
> 
> That's only much what I wanna say about the next chapter from here. You'll just have to discover what's in store for you in just one little click away! ^w^
> 
> I would love to hear anything from you at this point!


	4. Chapter 4

###  **CHAPTER 04**

Right where Rex saw the collapse, Emmet and the gang entered that zone. Duty number one was to visit and monitor this site and its progress, just as the pad highlighted under this category. It was reported that this sinkhole disaster actually occurred a day ago. It was obviously closed to the public at this point. Those who entered the area are only those having authority, such as the construction workers, Master Builder volunteers, and those sent by the queen, like Emmet and whomever accompanied him on duty. Everyone entering the site was required to follow strict guidelines and wear safety gear, which can be obtained at the respective entrances.

“Hey! If it isn’t out Emmet!” one of Emmet’s co-workers greeted him. Now, Emmet remembered this guy. He lived at Bricksburg like he did, and he was one of those who claimed he was never his real friend. He said it from a recorded interview Bad Cop showed him when he was being suspected as the special about six years ago. “How are ‘ya doing buddy?” he gently slapped Emmet’s back, which he stumbled a little because of his strength. That felt a little new, coming from him. He hadn’t yet said a greeting, and he got to him first. Emmet decided not to bother about it though. He had a job to do, and he needed their attention. He looked at him, as well as those beside him who were also one of Emmet’s past co-workers, and it seemed they were ready to hear him out. That’s a little odd. They never showed this much interest in him before, now that he could actually compare. He couldn’t also help but notice they do look a little older than how they used to be, and they definitely looked more brawn. That five-year long war had really toughened up the looks of these guys.

Emmet was staring at them a little oddly for a moment there. They eventually felt a little bothered by it. “Hey . . . you looked a little off. Where’s the happy and cheerful Emmet we got used to seeing from you?” he asked, admittedly he sounded concerned. “I’m fine, everyone. I was sent by the queen to see the progress. How’s the repair work going?” Emmet asked them. “It has been going slow. There’s lots of ground to cover around here, you hear?” a female co-worker answered. “It’s not safe around here. This place’s a mess! We need to make sure the ground is really stable before we can even begin any reconstruction,” another co-worker added. “We surely have to consider the foundations first. This might take a few days.” Their replies made sense, but it was not good news either. Things seemed uncertain if they can finish this in a week. The co-worker noticed that Emmet was not happy with what he just heard from them, so he reassured him: “But we Master Builders can work things fast in a cinch. It shouldn’t take that long. Soon, this place will be ready before the anniversary.”

“That sounds great, guys. How about those who were . . . here during the disaster?” Emmet asked another question.

> “We have toughened up over the years. We’re all fine! And you know what? Most of those who were victims came to help us rebuild this place. We’ve really embraced the Systarian spirit, you know? There’s nothing we can’t do if we all stick together!”

That was shockingly encouraging when Emmet heard that response! Despite the traumatic sight they’re seeing right now, the people here are trying their best to be positive about the situation. Emmet felt a little ashamed. He couldn’t believe he was fretting about the littler things a while ago. How could he possibly forget? This hit him deep down. It reminded him of that positive feeling, and how important it is for him to hold onto it now. He couldn’t help but smile genuinely at his co-workers whom he used to think they didn’t consider him as his friend, whom by the way, were now treating him nicely and cooperatively. He chuckled and said with good feeling: “You know what everyone, you’re right! **We** can do this! We’re all here **together**!” and everyone joyfully agreed alongside him, like workers being completely united as a team. This made Emmet feel really great inside, and it sparked within him that positivity; a lot better than just breathing in the spring atmosphere earlier. “Now Emmet, I can see you have the badge from the queen. What does she have to say about this?” the female co-worker asked smilingly. Emmet then freely started discussing overviews with them and the other volunteers who were with him, and accompanied them in their surveys.

* * *

The other workers were currently down the sinkhole, busy doing clean-up duty. They had to bring up as much rubble as they can, and soon monitor on the foundations so they can be repaired afterwards. Lucy was down here as well, speaking to those who actually witnessed the scene, for she had questions she wanted to be answered. “. . . Goodness! What can I say? It just went without warning! We suddenly felt the floor was trembling, and then BOOM! This happened!” one of the volunteers explained from memory what she witnessed being one of the victims of the sinkhole incident. “Have you heard any suspects?” Lucy asked. “As for now, it seemed like it just happened on its own,” she replied, but Lucy muttered: “That can’t be . . .” All of the victims she spoke to have the same common ground from their stories, but she found it hard to believe. She didn’t want to disturb the workers any longer, so she let her go, saying: “Thanks so much for your time, ma’am! I really appreciate it. Take care of yourself and everybody!” The worker gave back a smile and returned to work on the site.

Lucy then took a careful look at her surroundings as she cautiously walked about, bringing with her a scanner. There was much destruction to comprehend around here. Paved streets and decorative pathways are all disconnected from one another, completely unusable. What used to be just one level ground, now have been broken. Some sank down, some have raised up, and tilted. You had to jump down, find escalated pathways, or maybe even climb up if the rules allowed it, just to be able to navigate the area. Some particular spots are wet and flooded due to leaked underground pipes protruding out from crags and broken streets. They have already been sealed off by now, but some of the water are trapped on the surface, while some have seeped through underground. Roots can also be seen protruding out from the ground, as well as damaged beams and columns and steel frames protruding out from broken walls and building parts. Lucy had to watch where she’s going, or she might accidentally hit herself onto anyone of these if she’s not careful. However, not all of the buildings have collapsed to rubble. A few were still standing, but heavily damaged. She could notice everything that’s glass have been shattered too. She needed to be extra careful. It was quite a sight to behold, considering they’ve spent much time rebuilding this place from scratch over a year ago, now they had to start over it seems. She hoped to find some clues, but so far, she only scratched the surface, even literally. She only perceived destruction.

“If only we could figure out what’s actually causing all of this,” she muttered as she looked at her scanner to see nothing odd in particular appearing on the screen. Perhaps this was all just a natural occurrence after all, like how one of the victims describe it. “That just doesn’t make sense! Master Builders have never made anything . . . defective.”

A second sooner, she heard something disturbingly loud that’s coming right behind her. It was from a building. She looked back to see a concrete wall suddenly collapsed, and she was about to be crushed by it!

“AHH!!”

She swiftly jumped out and dodged what fell right on her. The sound of the collapse echoed throughout the site. She made it safe, but she quickly noticed more cracking sounds getting audibly louder by the second. More debris, larger and heavier, started falling onto where she’s now standing! She saw it all coming from that whole structure. It was unstable, it’s collapsing! She has to get out of there!

The debris fell on her, but she dodged to the right, skipped to the left, and just ran away to avoid getting crushed, as debris after debris fell and crashed onto wherever she stepped on. Unikitty saw it all from a distance. She never descended far down the sinkhole earlier. She was on higher ground, and had a clearer perspective. All that debris actually came from one of the weakened taller buildings. Some of its lower floors collapsed, causing the rest above it to fall out of stability, and Lucy was right on the spot of its determined impact!

“Wyldstyle! Get out of there!!” she yelled in fear.

Lucy aggressively ran as fast as she could, jumping and skipping on elevated surfaces to aim higher ground. But one particular surface she landed on abruptly started destabilizing. It cracked and quaked because it was fragile. This caused her to lose balance, and stumbled, but she had to get up! It was about to crumble completely, and she couldn’t afford to fall and tumble back down when more debris were still falling right toward her!

She suddenly felt someone grabbed her tightly by the hand, and yelled: “Lucy, come on!!”

It was Emmet! He had to cut to the chase. Emmet pulled her out of there and they started running on, holding each other’s hand so they’d stick together.

“Emmet?! Why did you—”

“I CAN’T just watch you get crushed!” he exclaimed.

He knew Lucy couldn’t save herself alone back there. She was already in a vulnerable state. He just knew he had to be there for her.

“AAahH!!” something caused Lucy to accidentally slip her hand off Emmet’s.

“LUCY?!”

“Emmet! I’m stuck!!”

A protruding steel frame accidentally cut through Lucy’s hood! They were running and jumping from platform to platform in panic, they ignored all the hazards this area is filled with. The strike was strong, the steel frame cut through the hood deep. Lucy struggled to get herself free, but the steel frame was rising an upward angle; she needed to pull herself upwards so her hood would come off free, but it was too high for her to do it alone, and there was no time! Emmet tried to rip her hood right out of the steel frame, but her hood was made of thick clothing material, he didn’t have the physical strength to tear it out!

They both gasped as they sensed they were instantly covered by the shadow of the falling building. Lucy froze! She couldn’t save herself, and Emmet. They were gonna be pulverized!

“EMMET!! WYLDSTYLE!!”

Unikitty gasped and yelled, as her friends were covered from her sight by the dust before she could see the impact of the building on them. She couldn’t see things clearly down there. There was dust puffing up everywhere. All the workers who were present were watching with her. Some just got back up to the top, as they too were escaping from the collapse. Unikitty continued waiting, hoping to see some signs that her friends are still okay, somehow.

Soon enough, the dust dissipated.

* * *

Breathing. She was surprised she was still breathing. The dust cleared enough for Lucy to open her eyes and see what just happened. The building did crash on them, but she was not crushed under. She was still intact on the same position, yet still stuck because of the steel frame. She really thought she’d be a goner . . . but where’s Emmet?

“Lucy, talk to me . . . are you okay?” she noticed Emmet was just right beside her, panting heavily.

“Yeah . . . We’re alright!” Lucy was relieved so much that she let out a little giggle.

Thank goodness Emmet was fine too, but she was perplexed on how both of them were still unharmed all along. She did nothing during the collapse.

“Let me get you out of there Lucy,” he said with a smile.

Emmet too was relieved they’re okay. He took his time and kindly pulled her hood up and out of the steel frame. Now that she’s free, she finally had a moment to calm her nerves and look around the place. There was heavy rubble everywhere, mounds and heaps of it, but not so much on where they’re standing.

“How . . . how are we not hurt?”

They were surrounded with so much rubble, it seemed they were cornered in, but her senses soon picked up that there was a light shining down on them. Emmet gently held onto Lucy’s hand and said: “There’s our way out.” That was good. They only just have to climb out now and return to higher ground, but Lucy felt something strange when Emmet’s hand touched hers. Unlike earlier, his grip felt weak, and it felt somewhat rough. She glanced at his hand and was shocked to see it!

“Emmet! Your hand! . . . It looks bad!” She was horrified to see his hand was bruised.

“Don’t worry about it. Now come on.”

Lucy saved her questions for later. They climbed out of the rubble, and soon got themselves on top of it. They saw everyone watching them, cheering in relief. “They’re alright! They’re alright!” Unikitty screamed with joy. Then Emmet and Lucy slid down the rubble and started walking to the surface. Now that they’re safe, Lucy could bring up a question she just couldn’t hold back in, for she could clearly see both of Emmet’s hands in broad daylight, and couldn’t ignore how bad they looked.

“Emmet . . . what did you do back there?”

“I . . . Master Breaker punched it,” he replied, hesitating to face her.

“Master Breaker punch—What?” she asked in disbelief.

Then Emmet looked straight at her concerningly and directly replied: “Look Lucy, I had no choice! I had to save you.” She still felt she needed more answers, but what happened back there was already a lot to take in, and wanted her mind to take a break. “Okay Emmet, let’s just get out of here before something else happens.”

The ground started cracking once Emmet took another step. The trembling noise grew louder. The cracks spread fast!

“I spoke too soon!” she rattled.

The cracks slowly broke down and opened a deep gap. Emmet and Lucy took a step away, and another step, and another step, until they had to get away from there as the gap grew wider because the ground they’re standing on began to collapse! The people gasped in horror. Unikitty could see the gap slowly encircling them, and it made her panic.

“YOU’VE GOTTA BE KIDDING ME!!” Unikitty transformed to her bigger form, Ultrakittty, and quickly rushed down to get them.

The entire sinkhole was starting to get more and more unstable the more it was disturbed. Gaps have widened, creating a trail that literally soon encircled around Emmet and Lucy. They soon found themselves trapped in their own little space. They couldn’t leap over. The edges have spread too far out, and they only had little ground to move about, and it was pitch black down there!

In panic, Emmet suddenly suggested: “You know what, Lucy? If we’re quick, we can build some sort of giant spring to bounce ourselves out from all of this! Just like in those video games!” They’re Master Builders after all. They could really make something out of the ground they’re standing on, but Lucy heavily questioned his plan. “Great! If we do that, this ground could collapse the moment we’re building one, and we’d both fall!” The risk was indeed too high and the time was way too short. They could see the edges of their ground cracking and falling apart, shrinking its size. Emmet pulled Lucy away from the edges and they stood on the center, embracing each other, as they looked around, watching their own footing, feeling extremely anxious as they could feel the ground slowly giving up on them. Their chances of escaping were getting really thin!

“**Look!! **Ultrakitty!” Emmet spotted her from the other side of the gap with a big smile of relief from his face.

Ultrakitty was approaching them quick, but she could also notice her own running alone made the situation a whole lot worse for the site. Her heavier weight created cracks on her trail, further destabilizing the area. Turning back is gonna be a mistake! She could only run forward and escape this site safely on the other end.

“GUYS! **GET ON!!**” she called to her friends the moment she got closer to the edge of the gap, getting ready to leap over.

She couldn’t land on the small ground Emmet and Lucy were standing, or else her landing might cause it to collapse. She needed to make a strong leap, passing by near them, so Emmet and Lucy could take the chance to jump and get onto her, and escape together to safety once she could land on the other end of the gap. Even she thought this was crazy! She’s putting herself in great risk! The gap is really spacious at this point, but this is really her friends’ only chance!

Then Ultrakitty leaped over, passing by near them. She was just close enough to Emmet and Lucy. They only had to exert one strong jump. On the right timing, Emmet and Lucy leaped, with arms fully reaching out to her. Lucy gave all she got and leaped high enough to land on Ultrakitty’s back, but Emmet wasn’t able to leap that high.

He missed her!

Almost . . .

Just barely grabbing her tail.

Emmet held onto it tight! He needed to make sure he won’t slip, but he forgot to consider how numb his hands actually were after punching the hard building walls earlier. His weakened grip failed him and he slipped!

Ultrakitty barely landed on the other side with Lucy on her back. The heavy landing on the ground was so critical, it crumbled due to her weight! The girls screamed as Ultrakitty exerted tremendous amount of effort just to get on foot before the ground could completely collapse! Panting, Ultrakitty quickly trotted onto crumbling surfaces and successfully managed to get onto the more stable ground shortly ahead of them. They finally got to the safer side of the edge, but they could still hear crumbling sounds behind them. Now they really had to get out of there!

“We made it! We made it Emmet! . . . Emmet?” Lucy looked around, but she couldn’t find him anywhere riding on Ultrakitty. “Where’s Emmet?!!” She panicked and looked back to where they just landed, and immediately she could barely see Emmet’s hands gripping right on the edge, struggling to get over!

“ULTRAKITTY! **TURN BACK!!** EMMET’S IN TROUBLE!!”

“WHAT?!!”

She stopped her tracks, scraping the ground, and looked back and saw Emmet’s hands right where Lucy saw it, but she also saw the cracks and crumbling that she needed to get through if she had to go back to Emmet to get him. She felt that going back seemed beyond reasonable. She hesitated.

“Wyldstyle, I can’t make it that far anymore!” she anxiously told her. Without questioning, Lucy got off from her and ran straight to Emmet. “WYLDSTYLE! WAIT!” Ultrakitty called but Lucy just ran. She had to get to Emmet! Even if it would mean she had to take the risk of maneuvering on crumbling grounds!

“Nnnggh! . . . I—I can’t . . . hold on!” Emmet stuttered in fear, as he struggled to hold onto the edge.

Exerting effort only increased the numbness of his hands, until it just gave in.

He fell!

“AAAAAA—”

His screaming abruptly stopped when he suddenly found himself managing to hold onto a little pipe protruding out of the crag. Emmet whimpered and groaned, struggling to get more hold. He tried lifting himself up, but his physical strength is really out of practice. He could only hang onto the pipe, panting and panicking. He couldn’t afford falling into the pit, but he also couldn’t help slipping, for it was easier to slip in such a cylindrical surface he’s holding onto. He kept holding tight, and hoped that somehow, his friends might still be able to save him.

“**EMMET!!**”

He heard Lucy calling to him from above, instantly feeling relieved beyond measure to hear that voice. He looked up and saw her reaching her hand down to him.

“**GRAB ONTO ME!!**”

Lucy’s hand was so close, it’s just that Emmet doesn’t have the strength to lift his arm up to reach it.

“I can’t!” Emmet cried.

Then they suddenly heard really loud crumbling noises that’s drawing near them. The edge was slowly falling apart. Emmet panicked as he was slowly slipping backwards to the broken end of the pipe. Lucy struggled to hold onto where she is so she wouldn’t fall. It was getting way too dangerous for the two of them to escape together.

“**Get out of here Lucy!**”

“NO! I can’t leave you here!!”

Lucy tried going a little deeper, reaching out to grab his hand by herself. She managed to touch his fingers slowly slipping onto the pipe, but that’s the farthest she could go. Emmet felt nothing when she touched his fingers. He could no longer feel his hands. Because of it, he couldn’t sense he already slipped!

“AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!”

**“NO!! EMMET!!!”**

Lucy quickly disassembled the edges, despite the heavy risk, and in a flash, built herself downwards a ladder faster than Emmet’s fall, and she immediately grabbed his hand! Emmet stopped screaming when he sensed he wasn’t falling anymore. He was stunned! He was so sure it was all too late for him, but someone did stop his fall. He looked up and saw Lucy grabbing onto him. He stared at her, while she looked down to him. They hesitated for a moment, hanging onto a crag, staring at each other. Lucy could see Emmet’s face slowly turned from a distressed expression to a gentle smile of hope. He looked adorable. Lucy just smiled back at him in relief, looking beautiful as the glitz of the sun shining down behind her. They stared at each other like that for a brief period, taking their sweet time . . .

. . .

But the moment had to be cut short because the crag just began crumbling down! The ladder shook along with it! Lucy immediately pulled Emmet up with him on the ladder and they swiftly climbed up to the top. The whole thing was shaking! They reached on the top of the edge, feeling nothing but adrenaline. They felt the edge was slowly collapsing the moment they got up. Lucy grabbed Emmet by the hand as they jumped and skipped about every broken piece of land they could bounce off of, until they reached to a more intact ground and ran fast to Ultrakitty. They were not yet out of the woods. They were still being chased by cracks that slowly collapsed behind them. They panted hard as they continued running toward her, running as fast as their own legs can take them.

“HURRY UP GUYS!!” Ultrakitty exclaimed, getting really antsy that they’re taking so long to reach to her.

Lucy was already yelling aggressively, running with all her might to escape the ground crumbling behind them. Then they leaped right to Ultrakitty’s back as soon as they got close enough, Emmet barely struggling to get on foot.

“Oh, no, no, NO! You’re NOT falling out from here this time!”

Lucy helped Emmet up and finally he got on, and then they braced themselves. Then Ultrakitty quickly sped up. Her giant size made her running cover more ground. It was easier to escape the collapse now. Before they knew it, they finally got themselves on higher ground, and looked back to see the places they trotted down a while ago collapsed completely. That particular area of the sinkhole at this point just got deeper. This only made the repair work take a lot longer than it actually should have been.

* * *

Ultrakitty, Lucy, and Emmet, gazed upon the whole view, taking their time to pant in extreme relief. For a while, they could feel the breeze blowing through them. It felt soothing to Emmet, and he slowly gave into exhaustion. He laid onto Lucy’s shoulder, losing strength to keep his eyes open. This concerned Lucy a lot. She embraced him behind his head, and rubbed his hair gently, like a mother pampering her child.

Emmet said in a weak tone: “. . . Thanks for saving me back there Lucy,” but with a smile he is able to express in his remaining strength.

“You saved me earlier so . . . I just had to, Emmet . . . I had no choice,” Lucy kindly replied.

It was clear to her that Emmet needed a big break after all of this, but she felt concerned he might take this otherwise. “You should return home and rest,” she said gently.

Then Emmet slowly held onto the badge that he pinned on his vest, and took it off. He weakly reached out to Lucy’s hand, opened it, and placed it onto hers.

“Emmet? What are you doing?”

“. . . You go on ahead . . . Tomorrow will be my next shift . . .” he replied, before completely shutting his eyes.

“What? No, Emmet, I can’t take this!”

Lucy could no longer reason out to him, for he stopped answering. He already dozed off in fatigue. She looked upon him in pity. Emmet was definitely not in good shape to continue on his duty. He was laying on her heavily, completely drained out of strength. She felt really bad for him and his bruised hands. She could only continue rubbing his head gently as he slept beside her.

Then Lucy looked upon the badge she was given, and she felt uncertain with this. She didn’t want to accept having authority for the job she was not given to, but the situation has changed and she could understand why. Emmet couldn’t go on anymore today. He needed rest. She was glad to sense that Emmet finally trusted her today, where he initially wasn’t inclined to for some reason. She wondered what caused this drastic change in his attitude. Yet, it was for the better. Right now, she needed to make a decision.

“Unikitty, let’s take Emmet home.” Lucy requested gently.

“What? Why?” Unikitty, still in her bigger form, was unaware of Emmet’s condition.

“He’s exhausted. He needs first aid. We’ll take over his duties for today, so he can rest.”

And so, they headed on. Lucy embraced Emmet within her arm as they rode on Ultrakitty in a slow pace, heading out of the city on their way to the mountains where Emmet and Lucy’s home was located, relieved that they’re now out of danger . . . or at least so they thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this chapter was originally going to be A LOT shorter, but I just had so much FUN adding all these intricate detailing of all these scenes, it went a lot longer than planned, but I really LOVED IT so much!! =D
> 
> I hoped you enjoyed reading this chapter as much as me writing it! ^w^
> 
> This was definitely not easy to write. I had to really shake up all my vocabulary as I can remember just to clearly describe everything that's going on as clearly as possible. There were a lot of proofreading done for this. I hope you were able to follow through everything that happened here though. o.o
> 
> I would really love to hear your thoughts~
> 
> While this chapter is a really stressful one, the next chapter will be the complete opposite. You'll understand why once you get to read it. ^w^


	5. Chapter 5

###  **CHAPTER 05**

_ “_ _Wait! Wait a minute! Let me get this straight. You want . . . me . . . to come over in your place tomorrow . . . with all our friends?!” Rex exclaimed in shock to someone he’s facing that was clearly unhappy on how he just sounded there. “Come on, Rex!” he pleaded. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea, Emmet. This lunch plan thing is a little too . . .” Emmet couldn’t care enough to bother hearing what Rex was hesitating to say, and frustratingly interrupted: “Yeah, I know! I just wasted all my effort driving this far from home, late at night, trekking through all these mountainous terrain outside the city borders, just to get here.”_

_“Dude, you know we have our phones for a reason,” Rex stated bluntly. “You never even bothered picking up!” exclaimed Emmet in annoyance. “Uhh . . . never? Heheh, is that . . . is that true? Ya’ maybe wrong, kid. That’s not true. The last time I checked_ _—”_

_“REX!”_

_“Okay, okay! I haven’t! Not in weeks! I get it! I’m sorry. You want me in . . . Geez . . . you’re . . . you’re really burning up.”_

_Emmet took a breather and sighed heavily . . . Then he continued sounding concerned, “I can see you’ve been so busy and occupied with . . . your own things and your raptors . . . but honestly Rex, I don’t really buy that! You’ve been missing us out.” Emmet waited for a reply from Rex, but he didn’t say anything back. Silence spanned a bit. Emmet really only received a blank stare, but he could actually discern that there was a little hint of regret on Rex’s face. Saddened, he tried his best to say this in a kind manner: “Look, I have no idea what’s really going on, and I shouldn’t be obliging you to come, but I was really hoping this time we can sort this one out . . . Just a little bit of your time, Rex . . . I missed hanging out with you, bro.” Emmet whimpered a bit when he said the latter. That bothered Rex. He felt bad even considering declining the invitation, especially being cooped in for weeks, but he decided to suppress that feeling. He changed the tone of the conversation by replying with a smirk: “Will there be waffles?”_

_“With butter, or dark choco syrup up to your choice, and also there’s gonna be fruit shake. Just like you wanted,” Emmet smiled a bit, thinking it would please him, but he actually really felt uncertain with that._

_“That sounds like breakfast to me,” Rex crossed his arms and legs as he leaned onto the side of his home’s entrance door, teasing Emmet for even trying to impress him._

_“You could say it’s brunch,” Emmet shrugged, “There’s also gonna be custard pies, croissants and cake . . . actually it’s gonna be ice cream cake! I really wanted to try that_—_I mean Unikitty!_

_. . . Unikitty reeeeally wanted to try that._

_Actually, she was the first to specify the thing, and I just went with it. And then Lucy wanted Hawaiian pizza . . . or maybe even beef-topping pizza. She hasn’t really decided between the two. Oh! And should I mention that the chicken we’re having tomorrow is gonna be dipped with creamy honey lemon, or glazed barbeque, or a special kind of gravy syrup? And there’s gonna be a bucket of fries seasoned with garlic and—”_

_“You really just wanna ruin my diet, don’t ya’?”_

_“Ha! You’re the one who said that. Not me!” Emmet chuckled._

_This unintentionally made Rex suddenly craving for all of those food he mentioned. He had been living a healthy lifestyle for so long, it seemed rewarding to take a little binge sometimes, so he regrettably gave in. “Alright, fine! You win! I’ll show up . . . at least for the food,” Rex gave a mean look as he pointed his finger at Emmet; supposedly wanting to keep him on his place, but instead Emmet became overjoyed! He rushed to give Rex a tight hug, realizing his intimidating stance earlier just failed to work. “Oof! No hugs ya’ ding-dong!” he grouched, not even bothering to hug him back. “Come on, I know you’re not new to this ‘cause you’re a real hugger deep inside,” Emmet teased, squeezing him tighter._

The last thing Rex remembered from that night is Emmet leaving back home satisfied, driving off through the bridge he could see just further ahead, which is connected to a pathway down the city. He got himself so lost in thought, the loudness of the metal rock music playing in his gym was no longer bothering him. He snapped back to reality. The music was indeed deafening, but he didn’t care as much. He just wanted some motivation, sinking himself into the music; all this just to keep his emotions at bay. With the appointment actually rescheduled for dinner, he had the entire day to himself to make up for lost time; activities he should have done hours earlier.

He had his casual Rex vest and outfit left hanging on a clothing bar installed to the metallic, bluish gym walls. He’s wearing his gym attire for now; a lime green tank top with the ‘R’ letter in blue imprinted on it, matched with grey jogging pants, and white running shoes. It was a flexible ensemble, highlighting emphasis on the image of his upper torso.

Bopping to the music, he had already spent almost an hour in his full-body workout; arm training being the last of the whole set. It took a lot for him just to earn this chiseled physique. One had to endure the pain and soreness that comes during and after exercise. He had to make this a lifestyle, but this is Rex we’re talking about. He’s used to all of this pain. This much constant effort and determination made him tough and rad in his attitude and looks for years . . . even though it was once done out of anger against his kind . . .

“No . . . focus Rex, focus!” he controlled his thoughts as he continued lifting.

It was not easy for him to move on from what he did in the past, and sometimes doing so felt off. To think, living in a peaceful city this long without anything to avenge for would have gradually changed him, but some things just never did. For one, he was still proud of his physique. No way he’s giving that up!

“Twenty-eight . . . twenty-nine . . . and done!”

He lets go of his heavy dumbbells on the rubber mat and felt all the soreness from his arms, and also his whole body from earlier, relieved in a way that it’s all through. He took some time to pant for air before he turned the music down to a mute. Then he did some stretches to avoid unnecessary and paralyzing delayed soreness later on. And afterwards, he stood still, closing his eyes, fixing himself to a straight posture, and took a nice, calming breathing session. Feeling relaxed and composed, his temper completely cooled off from being agitated earlier. That felt really liberating! In a better emotional condition, good vibes began stirring inside.

“Yeah! I feel pumped up!” he suddenly said enthusiastically skipping and hopping about, brimming with energy; similarly, to how he used to be when he lived back at Bricksburg after doing simple jumping jacks in the morning.

* * *

Zoom! The door automatically opened, and he went out of the gym strutting confidently, looking fresh with a changed shirt. A white gym towel was placed hanging on both his shoulders, partially covering his navy-blue, sleeveless shirt with a green ‘R’ imprinted on it. That workout earlier did make him sweat a lot, so he had to change; all the while drinking water from the bottle in his grasp to hydrate himself. As he bopped to the music that got stuck in his head, he expressed that smooth-looking smirk on his face, totally feeling the rhythm. He eventually reached the lobby, almost as if he was dancing on the go, and left his towel hanging on the rack nearby before he went outdoors for a little relaxing jog.

_“Hahah! Race you to the end, ya’ slowpoke!” Rex taunted Emmet as they jogged through a shaded pathway. “Brother, you are so on!” Emmet challenged him excitingly and went rushing to his speed._

Rex could recall fond memories like this when he was still quite new around here, taunting and belittling Emmet, as he jogged on this same pathway they often did. Although, that time had a much fairer temperature for it happened earlier in the day. Yet, Rex didn’t even bother doing the same this late.

_“Rex . . . Rex, wait! . . . I can’t keep up!” Emmet struggled as he was still running but farther behind. “Wha? It’s just three minutes in, and you’re giving up?” Rex snickered. Eventually, Emmet finally ran out of air and stopped. That didn’t look good for Rex. He ran back to Emmet, who was panting very hard and said, “Try using your heels to land and your toes to push. Control your breathing. Do it!” and Emmet tried just so._

Rex wasn’t being mean all the time. It was just that moment when Emmet eventually bothered joining him in his jogging routine, but Rex was too competent. He had to teach Emmet how to do it properly, so the fun wouldn’t drag. “Even I remember I used to be a lame runner,” Rex admitted, chuckling awkwardly when he stated it.

_Suddenly, they heard a loud sound of a vehicle engine coming from behind, and it immediately caught up to them. Rex and Emmet could then see the one who’s riding on it and they were shocked._

_“Lucy?!” they exclaimed._

_“You guys racing against one another looked fun! I just thought I’d tag along,” Lucy said with cheer. “Seriously? On a motorbike?” Rex asked with demur. She didn’t hold up for a chat and just accelerated ahead of them, replying to them loudly from afar: “Just try to catch up and experience what a real race feels like!” Rex fell for that taunt and then looked at Emmet determinedly, but Emmet is like, “Do we really have to do this race?”_

_“You can just ride along with me. Plus, it beats running anyways. Are ya’ up for that?”_

_Emmet wasn’t into the idea of racing against his special best friend but he could really sense Rex’s genuine enthusiasm. He doesn’t want to be left behind, so he decided to go along with it, nodding his head. Rex then quickly built a rad motorbike using bricks they can find nearby. They got on and rushed to catch up to her. “Hey Lucy, look! You against Team Awesome!” Rex called to her laughing, while Emmet was just scared, clinging onto Rex, and exclaimed: “I just want to elaborate that I don’t like this idea!!” They were already riding beyond speed limits, which didn’t matter out here. Not really sure what Lucy just got herself into, she chortled and teased them: “Wow, I’m racing against two Emmets. Literally! You guys are weird, very weird.” Then they quickly dashed onward to the mountainous horizon, as Emmet’s timid nature made him scream most of the time. _

“Ah, that kid still needed to grow up some spine,” Rex rolled his eyes, yet smirking to that thought, remembering who actually won that silly little race. Emmet never ended up wanting to ride behind him after all that, but he later admitted it was actually awesome when the two recalled that moment eventually.

Rex continued on jogging, reaching past the shaded pathway into the more open fields. The terrain this time is going to add some challenge to those who trek in this area for it was a hilly place, having plenty of slopes. Nevertheless, this only seemed like a warm-up for him. Having such endurance, he didn’t take a minute to stop. This day can actually turn awesome if he set his mind to it!

_“Listen Emmet, just make sure that when you see me throw the ball, don’t flinch!” Rex was beside Emmet, coaching him as they stood under the shade of a big tree. Emmet was holding a bat Rex lend him with, practicing his swing. “Okay, okay, I can do this, I can do this,” Emmet was getting focused, squinting his eyes as he then took his stance. Rex then grabbed the ball and wore his baseball glove, and walked back to his position at a distance. He adjusted his cap with a determined stare towards Emmet, throwing the ball in the air to get himself ready for a real throw. Emmet then gently patted the grassy ground with his bat, pumping himself up, watching Rex carefully until he made his move._

_The two were technically not in an actual baseball field though. They were actually out here for some bonding time with the rest of his friends. Rex and Emmet could see Benny and Good Cop grilling some barbeque further up ahead on a hill. Some of their other friends were also present, unpacking things out from one of their services, while some stood around near the portable table where they’ll dine, chatting with one another._

_Rex was now about to give a throw. He showed a smirk against Emmet. They have been playing baseball for quite some time, he knew Emmet already got the hang of it after several practice sessions. He wanted to give him a little challenge this time. He could see Emmet just seriously waiting for him. Then he swung his arms back high, holding the ball tight, and—_

_“Boys!”_

_Rex and Emmet paused right at their tracks and quickly looked to the person who called them._

_“Did we really come all this way to play more baseball?”_

_It was Lucy on the hilltop with her shades on, calling them. Her hands on her waist, sounded playfully upset. Rex and Emmet responded simultaneously: “Uh . . . yeah, yeah.” To Lucy, they kinda sounded dumb, so she nodded her head disapprovingly, but still giggling. “You’re supposed to be hanging out with the rest of us. It’s a bonding time, remember?” she reasoned out. “Right . . . bonding . . . bonding time with the rest of our friends,” Rex said a little off in tone because his mind was still stuck in their baseball moment. “We need more manpower with preparations up here. Come help us out!” Lucy commanded. “Okay . . . Just one more throw!” Rex pleaded, which Emmet also joined pleading, “Yeah, one throw!” Lucy scoffed at it, looking away from them, but she decided to be patient instead._

_Then Rex threw the ball at the next second! Emmet caught a little off guard, but he swung the bat in reflex, somehow smacking the ball successfully. Rex missed the ball. It flew right past Lucy and it hit right to the grilling stand, causing all the cooked barbeque flying off to the dirt!_

_“WHOA!!” “What in the?!”_

_Benny and Good Cop shrieked when they almost got hit by the ball. “Wha—What happened?” Emmet opened his eyes and looked around frantically, but he only saw Rex facing towards where Benny and Good Cop were. Lucy exclaimed: “Emmet! You hit our grill!” taking off her shades in shock. Emmet instantly felt regret about what he just did. “Oh no . . . I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” he rushed up the hill, throwing Rex’s bat behind._

“Yikes! That sure was a good way to end it,” Rex shrugged, feeling a little regretful too, but then he just laughed at that experience.

* * *

Then just a little further ahead, he could see a crag protruding right above the high most hill. It was one of the more incredible spots to camp out and watch the stars.

_Rex just fell in love with the ambiguity of the outer space. To him, it had an infinite amount of possibilities. Who knows how many other worlds are out there waiting to be discovered? “If there was another thing I’d regret, it would be this,” Rex said as he gazed upon the glittering night sky with Emmet right beside him. “Looking up the stars?” Emmet asked cluelessly, but Rex was too enamored by the sky they’re seeing tonight, he didn’t respond. Emmet continued guessing: “What’s so bad about those stars?”_

_“No, I meant, I still want to go to space.”_

_“. . . You don’t like being here with us?” Emmet misunderstood him and asked concerningly. “No! Dude! I mean . . . I still want to travel out there. Do you have any idea how much we can discover if we . . . just step out right of our comfort zones?” Rex explained._

_Before Emmet could respond, a raptor suddenly tugged behind him. “Oh ho ho! Hey there good boy!” Emmet said gleefully, rubbing its head, which the raptor enjoyed being petted. Rex saw that and was somehow displeased. “Emmet, don’t treat him like that,” he chuckled as he shoved Emmet’s hand out of it. “Hahah, why?” Emmet asked confusingly. “’Cause I trained my raptors to be . . . Rex-ceptional! They were meant to be bad boys like me,” Rex snorted, holding his chin up and did an egotistical pose. “Wow. You and your puns,” teased Emmet. “Hahah! What can I say? It just sounded great! Don’t ya’ think?” he nudged Emmet with his elbow when he said it._

_Then a few more of Rex’s raptors arrived the spot, bringing with them some more equipment that he wanted them to carry. “Thanks there, Clay!” Rex said as the raptor with that name threw a heavy bag right to his arms. He placed it down and took some things out and built a telescope. Emmet also handed down some more bags from the other raptors, and brought out some camping essentials, like camping beds and a sheet where he could place his packed foods from his own bag. The same raptor Emmet was tugged earlier also helped him out with the unpacking. “Hey, thanks there, big guy,” Emmet said to the raptor, wanting to say its name, but he couldn’t remember. “Hey Rex, who’s this one here again?” he asked when Rex was adjusting the telescope, looking through the lenses. He looked back to Emmet and glanced at the raptor beside him and replied: “He’s the Other One.”_

_“Oh! So, you’re the Other One. Wow, that is one . . . very un-special name?” Emmet said it awkwardly, scratching his head, which Rex replied sounding upset: “Hey! Don’t call him that! He’s special and important like all of my other raptors! Well . . . not to mean he doesn’t stand out, but . . . ya’ know what I mean!” Rex then went back to adjusting the telescope._

_“Yeah, yeah! I know what you mean! Calm down bro,” Emmet panicked a bit and wiped a sweat. He looked again to the Other One and he noticed something different about it. “You know what Rex, I think he likes me,” Emmet said adored. “Yeah? I think it’s because you petted him like some adorable dog when you first met him back at my ship,” Rex explained while adjusting the telescope lenses. The Other One suddenly roared at Emmet, quite loudly though, making Emmet startled. “Wha . . . What did it just say?” he asked a little scared. “The Other One just agreed to what I said,” Rex answered, but in dissatisfaction. “Wow . . . how do you understand these guys? Magic?” Emmet guessed, which it really ticked Rex’s nerve. “Magic—what?! Emmet, this is not just some plot convenience where I was suddenly given the ability to understand my raptors with no reason. I trained myself! Hard!” Emmet, however, did not understand what Rex just said, and was confounded. “It’s like the raptors have their own language, and if you wanna understand my raptors, then you’ll just have to learn their language. Ya’ get my drift?” Rex further explained, leaving Emmet expressing an “Ahhh . . .” slowly nodding his head in understanding._

Rex shook his head a little against Emmet’s stupidity and continued jogging, but instead of suddenly drifting to another memory, this time there was something they talked about that night he just remembered.

_“Being alone in space for so long, I’ve forgotten what normal life feels like, you know?” Rex chuckled, looking at Emmet as he swayed his hand across the view of the night sky. They’ve spent quite some time under the stars, they already changed to their pajamas and laid down on the star-printed sheet. The night was still young, and it felt nice and chilly. The two could talk all night long if they so want to. They’ve all got nothing but time._

_“I’m really glad you didn’t fade away when you were suddenly about to, Rex. You could have missed all this,” Emmet said gladly. “Yeah, I dunno where I’d really be if I did, but . . .” Rex hesitated, knowing what really could have happened to him if he did disappear back at planet Undar. “But, what? Be back-to-the-futured? I still don’t really understand all that,” Emmet guessed. Rex took a deep sigh and a little bit of silence came in, as he thought a little deeper. He could have blabbered a lot about the things he saw from that movie with a title like that, but for Emmet’s sake, he just answered this: “Like I said, I would have faded from existence. You know . . . gone, forever.”_

_“That actually sounds . . . really unsettling to me. I’m glad I didn’t have to experience something like that. Lucy would have missed me,” Emmet said it with a little chuckle. “Yeah . . . **she** would have . . .” Rex, however, said that a little sadly, and began to look away. “There is something that’s bothering me though. You said you are ‘me’ from the future. When I really think about it . . . it honestly feels weird too, you know?” Emmet pointed out. “. . . That you’re hanging out with your future self? Heh, I guess I’m one of your weirdest friends,” Rex said monotonously. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it that way, Rex. You’re actually one of my awesome friends! But what I was thinking was something more, something a little deeper,” Emmet continued._

_“. . . How deep?” Rex looked back to him and pried._

> _“If we are indeed the same person, like . . . the same one in all of existence . . . then we would have the same past, the same memory,” Emmet explained, which Rex continued listening._

_“You could remember how I used to live at Bricksburg, how Lucy and I met, how I stopped President Business from Kragle-ing the world, and that five-year long war against the Systar System . . . ‘Til right when we met.”_

_Rex remained silent the whole time._

_“But I couldn’t remember the time I spent under that . . . Undar planet you said you were stuck in for so long,” Emmet stated confusedly. Rex could see Emmet had an honest curiosity, and couldn’t really grasp the idea, but he doesn’t really like where this conversation is going, so he tried a lot to ignore something from this discussion. He faced the stars, and said to him: “Ah Emmet . . . ya’ still have so much to learn. Like I said, time-travel is so convoluted. It’s best just to go with it.”_

_Then Emmet asked, now looking at Rex: “So . . . how did it all felt like?”_

_“. . . Just lonely,” Rex replied in a melancholic manner after much hesitation, not wanting to elaborate the feeling further. Rex then shut his eyes tight when he continued: “You couldn’t begin to imagine how that really feels like.”_

_“Oh, I know you said that part before, but . . . I was wondering about the other thing. What made you think your friends would really . . . leave you behind?” Emmet pried._

_“Emmet!” Rex suddenly reacted, “Can we NOT talk about that?!” This flinched Emmet._

> _“Just . . . just don’t make me remember how it all felt like . . . Not right now! Not when things are actually awesome these days,” he faced away, crossing his arms._

_“I’m sorry Rex,” Emmet apologized, but he couldn’t see Rex’s face at this point, so he had to sit up. “It’s just that . . . you have taught me so many things these past weeks since the city completely stood. I just thought I could give something back to you in return.”_

_“Like what? Is ‘me’ being here with you and your friends even enough for ya’?” Rex intentionally wanted to be thankful, but he expressed it a little furiously._

_Emmet was starting to feel intimidated by how Rex just suddenly sounded at the moment. He gave out a little sigh and then said: “You’re right. Sorry I pried. I just couldn’t help thinking something about your past that I don’t understand. I always knew my friends would never give up on me.” Emmet then laid back down and continued, “I dunno, I guess it’s all this time-travel stuff that’s making my mind spin. Even my entire life I never thought of doing something like that.” Then out of the blue, he thought of something to perk up the mood. “Hey Rex, maybe we could go and do some time-travelling adventures sometimes. It could be fun!” he said excitedly, nudging on Rex’s shoulders._

_“Sorry to burst your happy bubble there kid, but my flux capacitor got busted because of your silly girlfriend! Remember?!” Rex spat back at him, referring to his time-travel controller, and moved his laying position to face away from Emmet completely._

_“Hey Rex, wait . . . what . . . what did I just say? What are you suddenly so upset?” Emmet got up and asked worriedly._

_“. . . Nothing . . . Nothing important. Just . . . just stop prying into my life,” Rex replied, sounding a lot serious this time._

_This caused Emmet to shut up and felt a little scared about talking further. The silence was becoming unbearable. He looked around and saw all the raptors already asleep. The sound of the crickets became the most audible thing they could hear around them. Rex just wouldn’t talk to him anymore. Emmet knew he had to take the initiative. He stood up and went to where Rex was facing, and he kneeled down right there, but Rex just continued shutting his eyes, trying to ignore him. “Rex, I’m sorry, really . . .” he apologized, and admitted, “I was too ignorant to notice how you’re feeling, and . . . I didn’t know it was that sensitive to you.” Sadly, Rex didn’t bother uttering anything, but Emmet couldn’t give up, so he gently patted on his shoulder, causing Rex to startle and looked straight right at him, and Emmet said: “But hey, as your brother, I want to let you know that I will always be here to help you feel better. You can trust me.”_

Rex could recall that moment when he started to treat Emmet more than just some friend he could hang out with for fun, or someone he viewed as too ignorant that he had to play a role of a mentor of sorts. He did begin to trust him, remembering how good it felt to have someone in this world where he could share his burdens with. Something that he lacked ever since he got stuck in the planet Undar.

* * *

He was getting a little exhausted in jogging for this long. He slowed down to a brisk walk. He then noticed he was already walking beside the wide, calm river that headed downstream to the bay of the city. Up ahead he saw that same bridge where Emmet drove through last night. It had a mixture of designs and colors contrasting from one another, as if it was done by different people in this one project. Rex gazed upon it from head to foot, remembering the time when it was first built.

_“Would you look at that, Rex! Things are going according to plan,” the general Sweet Mayhem said, who humbly worked alongside her friends with building this bridge. “According NOT to MY plan!” Rex complained, “I didn’t need all your help in the first place. I could have done this on my own, ya’ know!”_

_“Meh . . . he’s just insecure,” Unikitty uttered, teasing Rex as she took a bit of break from building. “I’m not!” he answered back upset. “If there’s anything we learned from you, it’s always better when you have a helping hand,” Benny said, floating about bringing some spaceship bricks. “What are you talking about? We only just met,” Rex grouched. To this Benny gasped, “What?! You forgot the time you helped me build my spaceship home down the city weeks ago?!”_

_“No, no, no! I mean, I only just lived here in about a month! Ugh . . . ya’ know what I mean!” Rex crossed his arms, looking away._

_“Emmet and Wyldstyle told me you are a future version of him, which means you’re still the same guy who helped us face Lord Business by teaming up against him,” Benny explained as he got to the higher parts of the bridge and resumed building there. “It’s good there’s no specific instructions to follow this time,” Batman suddenly appeared behind Rex startling him. Then he moved face-to-face and continued: “I still hated remembering that! You wanna know why? ‘Cause what you made me do was just . . . just—ARGH!! It was like being ‘brainwashed’ from being an epic Master Builder or something!” Rex took what he said as super insulting, he just glared really annoyed right back at him in silence. Batman then added: “I meant what I said. No apologies,” in a really blunt manner, which Sweet scolded him, “Batman! You’re not helping!”_

_Unikitty interfered, admitting something: “It still is really weird to get it all in. You are Emmet, yet you look and act so different.”_

_“And we were also told about ye’r tale of woe,” Metalbeard then joined in the conversation, rising up from the river for he was busy building the foot of the bridge, overhearing the conversation somehow, but Rex was starting to not like where this is all going._

_“Guys . . . let’s not talk about my backstory,” he pleaded, however, low in volume and was not clearly heard._

_“I know firsthand what’s like to be in space, but to be stuck there? . . . It made us feel really bad about how we treated you way back. That’s why we wanted to help you build this bridge together,” Benny explained. “But look at you now! You’re rad! Almost as rad as me!” Batman stated proudly, which earned him everyone staring at him disapprovingly. “What? It’s a compliment this time!” Batman anxiously defended himself, but he was simply ignored. Sweet then took her turn to say an apology as she went near to Rex, “I may not have been there to see how it all went for you guys, but I actually want to admit that I have a part in this too . . . I was the one who took your friends away from you in the first place,” but instead of being comforted, Rex slowly stepped back away from her and everybody. “Guys, really . . . y-you don’t have to say sorry . . . I am just not ‘the Emmet’ whom you owed an apology. Your Emmet is alright. Everything is fine. You saved him in the end. It’s all good,” Rex insisted, albeit his tone was a little shaky. This was evident enough to all of them listening, and felt somewhat embarrassed to respond. But Rex somehow couldn’t really hold himself back from keeping this in, so he rambled shamefully, with his fist placed onto his chest._

> _“It should have been **me**, the one to apologize . . . I came into this universe, and only made a big mess of things . . . I was mad, and I let it out on all of you!_
> 
> _You didn’t deserve it. I should have **never** travelled here in the first place . . .”_

He felt his emotions stirring up again. He cut off his thoughts, preventing himself from recalling what else he rambled about that day, as he was interrupted by a realization that he was now already on the bridge. His walking slowed down to a stop to take a moment and look around. He remembered why this bridge was built, to connect a suitable pathway from Syspocalypstar right to his home. Although, Rex can get to the city through any direction he wishes, but this was made more for a symbolical intention that his friends want him to remember throughout his lifetime. He then began to recall a time where he and Emmet were all alone as they faced the city lights from this bridge where they once stood.

_“Rex, stop beating yourself up. Everything will be fine. You’ll see,” Emmet told him worriedly when Rex kept hiding his face behind his palms in shame, as he leaned his elbows onto the low wall at the edge of the bridge. Emmet could only tap his shoulder gently, embracing him halfway, trying to comfort him, but it was difficult to make it work. “You have no idea how hard this is for me, Emmet. You can’t just say things like that to me so easily!” Rex complained bitterly, after he slid his palms down against his face in frustration, still refusing to face Emmet and everything else. “You’re right, I absolutely have no idea . . . but how could I say otherwise? All you’re doing is just looking back on your mistakes, you’re missing out on what’s good that’s happening right in front of you,” he reasoned out, causing Rex to slowly look up to the night city view. Emmet added: “Besides, you can’t take all the blame . . . After all, I was the one who destroyed the wedding.”_

_“Dude! I was the one responsible in tricking ya’!” Rex reminded him a little harshly._

_“That’s beside the point! The Rex I knew would have kept everyone and everything locked up in the bin. This is not the Rex I am hanging with now,” Emmet brought up a point, which Rex went to silently ponder about it. After a short while with Rex saying nothing, Emmet then embraced him a little closer, each other’s head leaning against the other side by side, as they both gazed upon the view. He then said sympathetically:_

_“Look, Rex . . ._

_Look at everything you’re seeing down there . . ._

_You had a part . . ._

_You helped us rebuild the city . . ._

_From that alone, you’ve shown so much that you’ve changed your ways, you need to feel proud of yourself!_

_And what’s most important here . . . is that you have been shown that we’ve forgiven all that you have done in the past, even if you keep admitting to yourself that your friends were really the ones to blame._

_. . . You are no longer a bad guy, Rex._

_What you’ve done for us and the city is outstanding. Focus on that!”_

_Emmet gently shook him, intentionally wanting to snap him out of his depressing mindset. Rex only kept staring at the view, with no response, but for Emmet, he could see that Rex was taking it all in. He did his best to encourage him, really reminding him of all these undeniably concrete evidences, hoping that as soon as Rex is able to, he would break himself free from being trapped in his own dark shell. Then the breeze from the mountains blew through them as it headed down to the sea. A gentle breeze sifting through. The wind blowing in their hair._

It felt very comforting to feel that same breeze as he stood on that same bridge, overlooking the city view in the day. This time, the breeze blew in front of him, from the sea. This similar feeling easily made that memory come back to him so vividly. Emmet was right. Since then, he had done so much to live peaceably with everyone. He really had no reason to feel bad otherwise.

“. . . Then . . . why am I being left all alone?” he wondered, admittedly feeling frustrated.

As soon as he dwelled on that thought, he felt his fist slowly clenching, but wait! He had to stop thinking that way. He wouldn’t want his emotions to get the best of him right now, but it was hard.

“I just don’t get it . . .” he muttered in pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There was so much heart put onto this!
> 
> This is personally one of my more favorite chapters to write~
> 
> My heart!~ <3 <3
> 
> And a little trivia: Out of all the 12 chapters in this first batch, this is by far the longest chapter of them all, mostly because of all those necessary flashbacks, strategically arranged to set the mood and drive the whole chapter in a soothing flow.
> 
> And also, there were some other flashback ideas that were written out because I could no longer make them fit in this flow. Hopefully I could pick those up again and write them down in a future chapter. =)
> 
> Don't forget to comment! I would really, really LOVE to hear from you anything you have to say. ^w^
> 
> The following chapter is going to be an interesting one, for it actually ties up with the rest of the few chapters following it. You'll soon find out! =D


	6. Chapter 6

###  **CHAPTER 06**

It was a little while ago that Unikitty took his friends home for Emmet to have his needed treatment. He was now sleeping on his bed, tuckered-in well, but still completely exhausted. This little house built on the mountains made the surroundings pleasant, peaceful and quiet, but Lucy wanted to make sure he was comfortable enough, so she took off his construction vest and blue polo shirt, and hanged them on a rack nearby, leaving Emmet his white undershirt on. She also opened the windows wide to let air circulate around the room. This should definitely help him feel at ease, allowing the breeze to blow through him where he’s laying on. She just finished applying first-aid on both of his hands, covering them in bandages in the end. With everything set and done, she was now in a position to leave Emmet here for a while as he recovers.

Before she could do so, she took some time to be by his side, gently holding his bandaged hand, as she sat on a footstool beside where he laid. In this calmer situation, she was now finally able to contemplate everything that just happened to them back at the site. She recalled what Emmet said to her about how he got his hands like this in the first place.

“Master Breaker . . .” she uttered silently, remembering him saying that.

It was too obvious that this was one of the many things Rex taught him. Her innocent Emmet punching through heavy, concrete walls from a tall building that was literally falling on them, and they were still completely intact? This was something he does not do. No doubt, he’s been influenced a lot ever since Rex’s around. All this made her feel so uncertain, not really sure how to take this in. The last time Emmet tried to toughen up, it caused real trouble to the whole universe!

Suddenly, her thoughts were interrupted when she heard a rattling sound from a cup of glass that was placed on a small table beside her. Then the table lamp beside it started rattling. Then she felt the floor vibrating, and the footstool she sat on trembling. The rattling sound grew louder. She then noticed the furniture around her wobbling left and right. This immediately felt unsettling! Lucy gasped and quickly got up on her feet, looking around to see everything tremble, slowly increasing intensity by the second! This seriously frightened her! To think they needed a big break after the incident earlier, now things are shaking again! She immediately sat beside Emmet, keeping him close. Her breathing accelerated, eyes widened, panicking inside, not sure what to do if the situation gets worse. Then as sudden as it occurred, the quaking instantly calmed down. The surroundings quickly became silent.

“. . .”

“. . . It’s gone . . .”

“. . . Is it?” she whispered traumatically, anticipating for possible aftershocks.

She immediately heard pacing footsteps drawing close from outside the room. The door opened and she saw Unikitty with a really horrified face. “You felt that?!” she panicked, which Lucy immediately hushed her down. Both of them continued to wait in silence, completely still. Despite all that, Emmet still sounded asleep, undisturbed. Things stayed calm. It eventually started to feel safe and secure. Yet, they were still agitated by the unexpected occurrence.

“Unikitty, let’s . . . leave quietly,” Lucy silently suggested her, and they did just so.

* * *

As soon as they got into the living room, Lucy could finally say something: “Unikitty, all these tremors couldn’t just be, quote on quote, _a natural occurrence_. I mean . . . could there really be such a thing?”

“I remember we used to have lava back at the old world,” Unikitty recalled, poking her face to think.

“That’s not what I meant. We rebuilt Syspocalypstar from the ground up, and I meant that literally! I am totally not a geologist, but I know full well that we’re not living near some volcanoes or something. And to think all these tremors and sinkholes are just happening right where we live?! Something is not right . . .” Lucy looked steadily on the floor, pondering deep with her hands on her waist. Unikitty wasn’t able to make another logical guess, so she remained silent.

“I wasn’t able to find anything out of the ordinary back at the site, other than . . . what’s already out of the ordinary,” Lucy continued, as she looked out the window looking for anything suspicious from the tremor earlier.

“Maybe we could just be overlooking something that’s really obvious?” guessed Unikitty.

“Like what?” Lucy wondered, still looking outside the window.

“I dunno . . . It could be anything really,” Unikitty replied, shrugging.

“And you’re not worried about all this?” Lucy looked back to her in concern.

“Oh, I am Wyldstyle. Believe me. But for now, I am thinking about something else . . . with Emmet only completed one task, you have the rest to deal with this whole afternoon.”

“Oh, so that’s what you’re worried about,” Lucy replied unamusingly.

“Emmet would want you to take care of this first,” Unikitty stated a point Lucy could partially agree.

Then she picked up the pad Emmet had and flipped through the pages starting at a random page somewhere in the middle, skimming through the instructions. She passed by Unikittty’s decoration assignment, and perceived why Unikitty would have something else in mind to be concerned about. But recent events were filling Lucy’s mind. She couldn’t really focus anymore on this monitoring assignment she had to do. Because of this, she reasoned with her: “The last thing we need right now is another catastrophic event that’s gonna destroy us all! If there is something I would have to do . . . it would be to get to the bottom of all this.”

Lucy made sense, and Unikitty couldn’t reason out further for she understood her bigger concern. Yet, Lucy continued skimming. She couldn’t let Emmet down when he wakes up later and finds out she didn’t do her part, so she skimmed until she got to the second task of the list. What she instantly saw was the requirement to wear a particular uniform.

“Looks like I need to wear this for the job,” Lucy showed to Unikitty what it was. It featured a drawing of a particular ensemble that Emmet was supposed to wear.

“A business ensemble?” Unikitty asked a little skeptically, “At least you wouldn’t have to wear your torn hoodie from here on out. It’s really in a bad shape . . . if you somehow forgot about it.”

Lucy went to get changed, while Unikitty headed to the kitchen to check on the microwave for something she was preparing. She waited for a few more minutes for the digital numbers to reach zeroes. As soon as it did, the sandwiches were then ready. She took those out and was about to place them in proper plates, but Lucy didn’t take long enough to return to her and help her out. “Unikitty, let me get those plates for you,” humbly said Lucy, as she pulled out three smaller plates from the higher drawers. Unikitty instantly noticed her new appearance, and it was too strikingly different for her not to comment on.

“Oh wow, Wyldstyle! For what occasion were you actually preparing for with that outfit?” Unikitty giggled a bit.

Ever since this morning, Lucy wore her usual casual clothing, which was her black jacket with printed pink and blue markings, brown jeans, and boots. Now that she’s wearing a legitimate business ensemble, such as black blazer, slacks, and pink inner polo shirt, it was clear on Lucy’s mannerisms that it wasn’t the most comfortable thing for her to wear, but she carried herself pretty well and looked professional nonetheless.

Lucy explained: “Sweet knew Watevera so well, she told me to prepare myself something like this, just in case. Emmet even approved of this. Looks like she was right.” Unikitty was only eyeing at her, head to foot. She knew it was to intentionally make Lucy look neat, but because she got used to seeing her looking like a goth rebel, she felt Lucy looked a little . . . overdressed at the moment. Lucy did not appreciate that stare.

“That’s right . . . You never saw me wearing any other than my goth casual look. I read your mind,” Lucy said annoyingly at Unikitty. “Well, this is definitely something the queen would want you to wear. She always wanted anyone of us to look like the part. You would look a lot better with your hair being black with this get up though,” Unikitty reasoned, which Lucy just rolled her eyes and went back to placing each sandwich on three different plates; one was reserved for Emmet.

“By the way, thanks so much Unikitty for making yourself available to be here with us for the whole day. I didn’t realize we needed this much help after all,” Lucy admitted.

“You were the one who told me that Emmet would have a special assignment. How could I resist to help? Threefolds are always stronger than two,” Unikitty said, as she sat on the chair, and Lucy joined in.

Unikitty started eating her own sandwich, and then said: “I figured we needed to fill our tummies after what we’ve just been through. You do have a list to finish by the rest of the afternoon.”

Lucy sighed as she looked on the badge she pinned on her blazer back in the dressing room, the badge Emmet gave her earlier. She stared at it for quite a while, pondering about something in particular.

“You know what, Unikitty? There’s always something else that’s going on with Watevra Wana’bi than what it seems to be,” Lucy uttered, which Unikitty listened as she continued munching, “I wonder why she even bothered choosing Emmet to handle all this.”

“Emmet’s way too good for this job, and she did need someone else to substitute for her while she’s gone. With Batman and Sweet accompanying her at the moment, Emmet’s really the next obvious choice! I thought you knew that already,” Unikitty replied as she took another munch.

“Yeah, I know that. Emmet has helped us through plenty of rough times that only his leadership skills could manage, and I am sure he could do the same now . . .” Lucy expressed her worry.

“Hey, we’re always by his side! He can do anything if we all work together,” Unikitty assured Lucy after she gulped down. She was almost done with her sandwich by now, but she noticed Lucy hasn’t even taken a bite of hers. She then asked: “Are you worried about taking over?”

“What? No, no, I’m not,” Lucy swiftly answered.

Then she checked on the pad again where the instructions were written down, and went to see more closely on what’s number two on the list. She eventually saw a business necktie drawn on the page. The moment this dawned on her, she then mumbled something which Unikitty overheard: “The queen had this whole month to prepare for the anniversary. Then now, all of the sudden, we’re experiencing these tremors that could potentially destroy the city? This pattern of coincidences is way too familiar. The more I think about it . . . the more I am starting to realize who we’re really up against!”

“Who?” Unikitty asked intriguingly.

Lucy immediately ate her sandwich without anymore hesitation, finishing everything in just a few big bites. Then she requested Unikitty in a serious note: “Could you stay here at home and watch over Emmet for me? I think I can go off alone tackling this part of the list. I’ll meet you back here when I need you for the decorations.” Unikitty simply agreed, but still shocked how Lucy quickly ate her sandwich though, as if she was suddenly in a hurry . . . Well, the moment she saw her leave the house, she was definitely in a hurry. She didn’t even mention who she had in mind. She could only wonder who she meant.

* * *

“Alright, no more hiding!

I know what you’re really up to, **LORD Business**! If you are still secretly being called that!” Lucy yelled in front of him as she banged her palms on her desk, leaving him completely shocked by her outburst. “I’m sorry, what now?” he sounded baffled. “Firstly, you misleadingly organized Taco Tuesday as your secret plan to freeze the world, and now that you were just simply cast aside in our last adventure, you’re getting even?!” The president was just completely dumbfounded by Lucy’s accusations, but she didn’t stop there. “You want to destroy us all by bringing the whole city down during the anniversary! The supposedly happiest holiday in all of Syspocalypstar. What the irony! It’s like your name is written all over it!” she continued harshly. He just gave her a silent stare, thinking all about what she just said since she barged in his office. Then he just laughed out loudly at her, and Lucy just stood there, looking at him meanly.

“You have got to be kidding me! Hahah! You’re . . . You’re kidding right?

I willingly left you guys on your last adventure. I wasn’t casted out!

I really didn’t want to be part of your whole group anyways, you know? Too busy with work and what not?

Did you even check your sources?” the president joked at her.

“Don’t try to make us beat around the bushes while you enact your secret evil plans! We have been experiencing tremors here and there for weeks! And look what just happened down there yesterday when we tried to ignore the warning signs!” Lucy expressed her concern. “Hey lady, have you forgotten that I moved on from all that I did? Just look at me! I’m just wearing my innocent-looking golf attire,” he explained.

“. . . In your office under the name **President** Business? Ugh! Why did I even bother wearing a business attire just to be here?!” Lucy complained. “I get you! Mrs. Wana’bi changes so much, I bet it never really dawned on her that you can’t! Look, I can see you have the queen’s badge so you could come here. I assure you I have no secret intents. I was hired by Mrs. Wana’bi to handle the business aspect for the whole anniversary. It’s even there in your pad! See?” President Business reasoned out. “Actually, Emmet was supposed to be here, but something happened to him and he needed a substitute, but that’s beside the point!” Lucy shook her head and banged on the desk again. “What happened to the special?” he asked in concern. “Not really important to talk about now, but let’s just say it’s because of** your** doing, he’s not here to see you!” she pointed at him harshly. “Haven’t you been listening?!” the president’s temper was starting to boil up at this point. Then suddenly, a thought came to Lucy and muttered: “Unless . . . if the queen is really behind all of this madness, she would be the real culprit! . . . Wait, this doesn’t make sense!”

“You’re right, it doesn’t make sense,” the president crossed his arms as he laid back on his soft business armchair, raising his eyebrow. Lucy had nothing to say after that. She began to feel a little stupid.

“By the way, you look excellent on your business attire . . . what is it they call you again? Wyldstyle? You know, I could hire you full-time as one of my managers in this building,” he commented. “No! No! No! Don’t try to change the subject, president!” she exclaimed, but President Business no longer wanted to have more in this pointless accusation, so he stood up, raised his voice and said: “Look! If you’re **not** gonna change your terrible attitude, I will kick you out of this building, and the queen will be the first to know!” Lucy was silenced by his threat. She looked down to the badge pinned on her blazer and thought about how bad she just acted being Emmet’s substitute, so she calmed herself and cleared her throat. “Sorry, Mr. President. I can assure you it won’t happen again.”

“. . . You even sound professional . . . for someone who used to be a rebel,” he uttered and sat back down lousily with arms crossed, no longer in a good mood to really mean what he said.

* * *

Back at Emmet and Lucy’s house, Unikitty busied herself preparing a small container filled with fresh pineapple juice for Emmet. Once it was ready, she carried it using her unicorn levitation powers along with the sandwich on its plate. Whatever Lucy was planning to do, she hoped she would find the cause behind their concerns. For now, she decided not to dwell on that and focused on helping Emmet be accommodated. She perked herself up, and headed to the bedroom where Emmet was resting, humming a happy tune as she trotted.

However, as soon as she entered the room, she **screamed** like the cat she is when she caught sight of what’s right beside Emmet.

Something big!

Something horrifying!

Because she was facing against the brightness of the window, the thing she saw became like a silhouette.

. . . But it had yellow eyes.

It had sharp teeth!

The silhouetted image caught sight of Unikitty, and just stared at her, soon turning into a glare. She was paralyzed in shock. She dropped the sandwich and the juice on the floor, horrified at the beast right in front of her. The crashing sound of the plate and container didn’t disturb Emmet, but it heavily disturbed the creature. It began to growl, slowly moving closer to her. She looked right and left to plan some sort of escape, but she also needed to protect Emmet somehow. She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t move.

“. . . G-Good beasty . . . Just stay where you are . . . Don’t do a single thing against my friend Emmet there . . . If you do . . . then you’ll be sorry!”

The creature was not affected by her little threat. It uttered a low roar, slowly drawing nearer and nearer, getting ready to pounce.

The moment she realized its attention was locked onto her, she knew what she had to do. Instantly, she ran back to the hallway! The creature pounced so she could get captured, but it missed her. Instead, it crashed onto the wall!

It crashed its head so hard; it made a hollow.

Shaking its head a bit, it didn’t took any moment longer for it to get right back to its senses. Its pointy pupil caught sight of Unikitty running ahead, turning right to get herself lost in its sight. Quickly, it rushed to get to her!

Unikitty got herself first into the living room, where the light is well spread-out. She now had the chance to get a clearer look of whatever was chasing her, but with the sound of the stomping getting louder every second, until it appeared out from the hallway, she was stunned to realize what that monster really was!

“R-Rex’s raptor?! What is it doing here?!”

The raptor didn’t waste a second. It roared and dashed right to get her! Unikitty swiftly managed to dodge its attempts to bite her and scratch her right on the spot. She jumped out of there and landed onto the top of a nearby bookshelf, but she knew she wouldn’t be safe up there for long.

The raptor suddenly grabbed the shelf high and furiously shook it, trying to knock her off the top! She held on tight, yelling as she was shaking along with it. She could notice books and literature were thrown about on the floor. It’s making a mess! The longer she held, the harder the raptor shook it. There was no stopping!

Without remorse, the raptor just banged the shelf onto the wall into pieces! Quickly, she was able to get out of there and avoided the impact. She had no idea why it was suddenly rampaging, but she knew she couldn’t stay in the house any longer. With her suddenly becoming a target, it’s clear it would do anything to get rid of her. She had to get out!!

She leaped right to the front door, but the raptor managed to slap her away from it using its long tail. She tumbled down, but got up. She saw it moving right in front of the door, guarding it, as it growled at her. Now the raptor was suddenly trapping her in. Unikitty kept trying to trick it to move away from the door, but the raptor was too snappy to be fooled. She couldn’t even get any closer. It just threatened her with roars and slashes and bites!

“Let me out!! I’m one of Emmet’s friends!” she yelled.

It was just so stubborn! She couldn’t reason with it. She couldn’t get it to step away. She needed to find some other way to escape, so she dashed to the kitchen, trying to get out through the back door, but the raptor caught up quick! With big leaps, it ran, and jumped over her and got there first to block the door! It twirled to slap Unikitty with its strong tail, but it missed, for she jumped to dodge it, but while in the air, she was knocked onto the nearby wall in an instant; clinging onto it by the raptor’s strong grip! Its head was so near to hers, she could practically hear its low menacing growl loud and clear.

> “W-Wow . . . Rex wasn’t kidding when he said you guys were **exceptionally** trained . . .”

She suddenly felt something funny from her tummy, as the raptor was squeezing her tight from there. Just before she was slashed by its sharp claws, she vomited a ball of confetti right to its face! Blinding it! That recoiled the raptor as it roared in shock! It let go of Unikitty, struggling to wipe all the sparkly bits of colorful confetti paper off its eyes. It was thrashing about; it caused a wreck around the kitchen. She took this perfect opportunity to escape, and frantically ran back to the room.

“I gotta wake him up before it’s too late!!” she screamed in her thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uh-oh! Looks like more stuff is gonna happen from here. o.O
> 
> Can you guess who that raptor really is, out of the many ones Rex have?  
There was a reason why one of them was already mentioned and foreshadowed three chapters ago. x3
> 
> And about that other mystery? It's gonna be tackled throughout this whole book.  
That's all I wanna say about that at this point. TuT
> 
> Wanna know what's gonna happen next? The next chapter will be a treat! ^w^


	7. Chapter 7

###  **CHAPTER 07**

Smack . . . Smack . . . Smack!

The tennis ball crossed over the net, back and forth from one raptor after another. These two big boys were in a tight competition, and neither one of them was letting up! No one has yet missed a shot. Their game has been going on for almost an hour by now. Both of them panted. Tension and expectation just rose higher and higher every moment each raptor made a successful swing. Its own cheering quad could only wait eagerly and anxiously until one would actually miss a hit.

And SMACK!

The raptor on the right went for a snappy hit, causing the ball to head straight towards the farther corner, away from where the other raptor was currently standing. And just like anyone would soon see, the raptor from the left leaped for a far-reaching swing and missed the hit!

“_Oooooooohhh . . ._”

If their reactions could be in human terms, it would have sounded just like that. They all just witnessed the defeated raptor crashing harshly after that big leap, but it soon got up, wiped off the dust from itself. However, judging by its reaction, it didn’t take that loss pretty lightly. It grumbled, stomping out of the field begrudgingly, shaking its head, but the opposing raptor didn’t really care. It was just too focused on its own victory, rushing to its own support team to celebrate with them.

This often-competitive atmosphere can at times become too extreme, but these raptors just really loved to play their favorite sport out here in this spacious park that was built for them. Back when they decided to live a life with their trainer in Syspocalypstar, Rex took the time to build a place for them, recreating a landscape similar to how they used to thrive before he took them in. It was inspired like one of the more mature movies he watched; just like Jurassic Park. Yet, he knew his raptors needed something more than just a very expansive field to simply roam around freely. These raptors have been trained so hardcore; they couldn’t live like ordinary raptors anymore. It was just incredible that when Rex chose to _plant_ his home on the mountains, it came with a very expansive _‘backyard’_. It was definitely, superbly more spacious than Rex’s old ship could have ever offered.

May we be reminded that Rex had adopted a lot of raptors, so why wouldn’t he not make the most of this place?

So, Rex thought of building in lots of awesome features that allowed his raptors to continue enjoying activities they learned to love when they used to live in space toughening up. Admittedly, life in Syspocalypstar can sometimes be a little bit too . . . peaceful for most of them. Since they had a lot of rad attitude, these raptors would love to do something or anything to ignite them to be challenged from time to time. To address that need, he built them obstacle courses to give them opportunities to demonstrate their newfound skills, such as jet-flying, or skateboarding. There are also sport fields such as those used for soccer, baseball, and like the one they’re in right now, tennis courts.

Speaking of tennis, Rex kept himself occupied by watching those two raptors playing that sport from the overlooking view. While leaning on a varnished wooden railing, his observation stuck upon that particular raptor who just lost the game. It was so caught into the competition; he could notice it felt really bitter when it lost. He then saw its raptor friends gathering to it, consoling that lost one, almost like they’re brothers. Unusually, that sight really hit Rex deep down. It felt relatable. Out of all times he saw competitive gameplay around here, it is only now when he suddenly became glum seeing one of his raptors lost a game that miserably.

It all suddenly felt unbearably sappy.

He thought a little jogging earlier would calm his nerves, but these feelings were still getting to him. It’s becoming really ridiculous at this point! He shook himself, trying to refute this sudden emotional charge out of his system. He’s been trying so hard to relish himself since he woke up from a terrible sleep, the last thing he needed is another ounce of pain!

“**OUCH!**”

Rex screeched when he suddenly felt someone just banged his head by a racket. He looked back irritated, seeing that it was actually one of his raptors who did it.

“What the—Cobra?! What was that for?!”

The raptor with that name didn’t feel it deserved any sort of blame. Because Rex’s attention was so glued to the field below, it wasn’t noticed at all when it repeatedly called out to him, until it got really impatient. Although, to get his attention, Cobra intentionally did a gentle thump using the racket, but to Rex, that almost felt like a hard smack right on his head. He just glared at Cobra really annoyed, teeth grinding, but it just disregarded Rex’s reaction and wiggled the racket its holding, looking down at him with a smirk. That instantly changed his expression into something like one would look like when recalling something he just forgot.

“Oh, um . . . is it . . . our turn? Yeah? I know that,” Rex said it very pretentiously. He then swiftly grabbed his own racket and went down the metallic staircase towards the field below, with his raptor following him. But as it followed him from behind, Cobra could notice Rex’s stature as he walked down the stairs. Contrary to his usual manly-soothing strut, his movement was actually quite sluggish, like he was not even excited to have a good match if anything else. Cobra was not liking this at all. It roared at him unamusingly, which Rex hastened, uttering: “Wh-What? What are you talking about? I’m fine! I’m alright! No, I am pumped!” quickly straightening himself up and switching to his more confident posture the moment he said this.

Cobra just wasn’t fooled. It just shook its head in disappointment. Yet, Rex continued to hold onto this pretense and just proceeded downwards.

Before they reached the tennis court, Rex seized his glance at Ripley among the crowd of raptors. He recalled that he gave it a task earlier and wanted to be updated, so he went to it and asked: “Nothing unusual happened around here while I was out, Ripley?” Ripley reported that nothing unusual had indeed happened, except that a while ago, he was able to detect faint tremors coming from the city using the newly built seismograph Rex made for such a situation.

“Huh . . . so, there was another tremor.”

Ripley went on to proceed that there was no damage reported around the park, or in their big house, which Cobra immediately inserted itself, correcting Ripley by actually doing a quotation sign with his claws when it mentioned to Rex about their ‘_house_’, but everyone aboard was still safe. Ripley also took the initiative to check upon every raptor in attendance and it roared something in question, which translated: “_But I couldn’t find the Other One._”

“Ah, him,” Rex started, “Connar told me he’s still actually with Emmet. He’s been so attached to that kid, he literally begged me to agree that he’d stay with him for a couple of days,” he said that with a little hint of regret, but he chuckled at something he just realized and continued:

> “Of course, Emmet couldn’t contain himself. He always wanted to have his own raptor.
> 
> . . . Hahah, that kid. He’s so much like me.”

He then pondered to that thought that one of his raptors was now living with Emmet in a puny house. Would the Other One really suit well being confined in that kind of environment?

He could only utter: “If he adjusts there pretty well and always be a good boy, Emmet wouldn’t need to suffer what I’ve been through when I first got ya’ all . . .” Rex suddenly hesitated when he remembered one certain possibility that concerned him. “You guys have always been so wild . . . I hope he’s not causing any trouble . . . ‘cause Wyldstyle would kill me!”

* * *

The Other One cautiously peered in Emmet’s room, and saw that he’s still sleeping soundly. It looked around and saw the room seemed undisturbed, so the raptor slowly went in. It still has a few of those sparkles from Unikitty’s vomit all around his muzzle and head; some peeling out from its face, falling to the ground. It really did not like that surprise attack, so it continued looking for that cat, growling in rage.

Unikitty could hear its footsteps coming in and that scary sounding growl, but she was nowhere to be seen. She was actually on her way here earlier so she could save Emmet from that raptor, and yet he’s still on his bed as if she was never here. Where is she?

“. . . Oh, why didn’t I just flee when I had the chance?! One wrong move and I’m doomed!” she cried, whimpering in fear inside Lucy’s cabinet, with all her clothes covering her.

She tried her best to wake Emmet then, but she ran out of time. Emmet just wasn’t budging, or at least that’s what she observed. Now she needed to wait patiently until the raptor goes away somehow. Could things get any worse than this?!

So, she waited . . . and waited . . . concealed inside that cabinet . . .

Things seemed to have quieted down for some reason . . .

Being a cat, she had higher hearing perception, so she relied on her ears, swiftly turning them side to side, picking up whatever vibrations she could perceive. She couldn’t risk opening the door to take a peek. That would be stupid! In here she could remain safe until she gets the next opportunity to escape, but she really, really, **really** hoped Emmet wouldn’t be gobbled up by that monster!

Suddenly she realized that hiding doesn’t seem like a good option anymore . . .

If she just stayed in here, it would all be too late for Emmet!

“I can’t just hide here and be all scared! I need to face that thing!” she anxiously encouraged herself.

Then shockingly, the raptor violently broke the cabinet door right off its hinges!

Unikitty got exposed and freaked out!!

Without even a passing thought, she was forcefully being pulled out from in there, scattering Lucy’s clothes all over the floor.

The raptor bit her tail to grab her out; Unikitty hanging upside-down below its jaw. She’s now way too close from being gobbled up herself. She froze when things appeared like it’s all over for her, unable to decide if attacking, or transforming to her bigger form would beat the odds. She could only scream at the top of her lungs:

“DON’T! DON’T EAT ME! PLEASE!!

I taste terrible, I SWEAR!!”

The raptor just growled at her mercilessly, knowing exactly what to do to get rid of her for good! Before it could throw her in the air and gobble her up, all of the sudden, both Unikitty and the Other One heard someone groaning beside them, immediately pausing their position like static.

“. . . Unikitty? . . . Is . . . Is that you?”

Her screaming broke his rest. It was Emmet fidgeting about, slowly gaining back his consciousness, eyes struggling to open.

“EMMET! GET OUT OF HERE—_mmph!!_” the raptor quickly gagged Unikitty’s mouth, squeezing her face by its rough hand.

It then freed her tail, but still clinging in an upside-down position by its grip. Unikitty could only make murmuring sounds now, diffused in volume, as she could see the raptor slowly moving closer to Emmet. This horrified her! She struggled so hard to break free, its grip was just too strong to get off. Then she froze in the height of suspense the moment when it moved its head way too close to Emmet’s head, face to face. She instantly imagined the raptor gobbling up Emmet in a horrific way. She shut her eyes! Extremely terrified to see it all come to reality!

. . .

She just shut her eyes . . . She couldn’t bear to see it!

The span of silence went strangely longer than expected.

She was perplexed why there were no instant sounds of horrific screaming, or something like it . . .

But what she heard instead was . . .

Emmet chortling?!

“S-Stop! Other One, stop it! Hahah!”

Unikitty opened her eyes and was totally taken by surprise when she saw the raptor actually licking on his face. Not gobbling it! Emmet tried pushing the Other One away, but the raptor just insisted on continuing to give him affection. All this took quite a moment, fully revitalizing Emmet as he giggled and chuckled. The Other One made sure he stayed this way a little longer, so it rubbed against his neck, chest and belly, tickling him, and Emmet just burst out in laughter! As soon as it stopped, Emmet then gave his raptor a gentle embrace around head, and it happily rested on his.

. . . Unikitty just saw it all, completely flabbergasted.

All that cuddling really eased the raptor, its grip on Unikitty gradually loosened, causing her to fall onto its foot. That started the Other One! Immediately, it turned to face her and its expression instantly changed to madness, growling at her.

“Unikitty?!” Emmet exclaimed, extremely startled to notice this.

Then in a blink of an eye, the raptor became enraged and attacked Unikitty, but dodging it!

“WAIT! Other One! Stop it!!” he quickly commanded.

But it was not stopping. It just slashed and slashed just to land a hit, and Unikitty dodged every attempt and landed anywhere she could around the room. This relentless assault only caused a huge mess everywhere, and things were getting pretty ugly very fast!

“I SAID **STOP!!!**”

Emmet jumped off the bed and stood right in between them, arms widen out to protect Unikitty, but the raptor just growled, not wanting to hold back. Seriously confused and agitated, he yelled:

“Don’t hurt her! She’s my friend!”

Panicking behind him, Unikitty added:

“That’s what I said! It didn’t listen!”

But the Other One roared harshly at both of them, which Emmet understood it loud and clear.

“No! Other One! She didn’t hurt me, or my fists! I hurt myself! It was an accident!”

That really confused the raptor, but it listened. All this time, it thought Unikitty was responsible for what had happened to Emmet, but once his words got to its senses, it slowly held back his claws away. Its stance softened, as well as its expression. Emmet could notice it was snapping out of its rage, so he uttered softly:

“Okay . . . Okay . . . Listen to me . . . Everything is fine . . . It’s all good.”

Emmet slowly swayed his hands up and down in repetition, trying to gently calm his raptor, and just as he hoped, the Other One did calm down. Its eyes softened, pupil widened, looking more kind and in control. Emmet took this opportunity to slowly reach out and rub its head, and the Other One allowed him to do so. It purred once it felt comfortable, and Emmet just gently smiled to it. He wiped off some sparkles that were still sticking onto its muzzle, and then he hugged its head, whispering kindly to reassure his raptor:

“Don’t worry, Other One. I’m okay . . . I’m okay.”

The raptor purred a lot loudly, which Unikitty heard, affecting her emotions. She too sensed all the love and care these two showed, and eventually began to understand why it was rampaging in the first place. The Other One was only concerned about Emmet, and wasn’t able to grasp the whole story, so she approached the raptor and tried to reason with it.

“Hey, I-I’m sorry I got you all startled earlier. I was only trying to help Emmet feel better, like you. Honest.”

Emmet and the Other One looked around the place, and then noticed the spill on the floor right in front of the door, along with the spoiled sandwich. As soon as the raptor really saw everything it just did, it began to mope, and uttered a sad cry. Emmet heard it and said:

“It’s alright, big guy. Don’t let it get to ya’!”

But the current state of the whole place was too undeniable to ignore. This room was not just Emmet’s, but he also shared this with Lucy. He couldn’t bear to imagine how she would react if she discovered this. Yet, he attempted to stay positive, continuing to assure the Other One:

“Sure, you somehow created a mess around here . . . b-but everything’s gonna be fine! You’ll see!”

However, Unikitty pained that she could not agree with him. She interfered, hesitating:

“Umm . . . Emmet? I . . . I hate to be a positivity crasher, but . . . there’s more you need to see.”

That kind of tone she’s making only made Emmet feel nervous. He hoped whatever she meant was not going to be worse than this . . .

. . . but it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, what do you think might happen next? xD
> 
> Things are getting tense, and the next chapter will go head on!
> 
> Without further ado, go check the next chapter to see what happens next! =D


	8. Chapter 8

###  **CHAPTER 08**

“Before you go Lucy, I just wanna say that I’m so glad you visited us without bringing any company at all! Just imagine how hard it could have been to discuss with you this matter when we’re keeping this a secret!” Lucy listened to a woman beside her, who had long blonde hair tied in a ponytail, highlighted by a pink stripe. They were also accompanied by two more girls, as they all exited from the entrance of a large dome-shaped building. This was another place Lucy was supposed to visit as part of Emmet’s assignment.

She then said to the woman: “Not to sound grateful that Emmet isn’t here or anything, but I really agree with you Cindy! Just be sure that not a single word comes out from anyone of us . . . **not** even from that DJ guy you just had to invite to come over, Lula!” She annoyingly stared at another company of hers with that name, whose dark brown, short hair had highlights of lime green and pink stripes, with a white flower attached to her hair as an accessory. Lula clarified: “I didn’t invite him dear. The queen insisted.” Quickly, she quieted herself down and went to a whisper, proceeding: “You didn’t hear this from me, but I was told by the general that he could also be a valuable asset to help us with what’s really going on around here lately. It’s just a bonus that he’s coming here out of all convenient times! We definitely needed a DJ!”

Lucy knew what Lula meant, so she stated in displeasure: “I really don’t get it sometimes how her logic tracks . . . choosing someone who used to be our DJ, and could somehow help us with fixing these tremors is beyond me.”

“I get you, Lucy, but don’t worry about all that! This will all just be between the four of us . . . until of course we get to explain it to the DJ kid eventually. All this for the sake of your special-best-friend! You can count on us!” the other girl assured Lucy, who had long brunette hair with two pink stripes, wearing a hairband that’s pinned with a cat’s smiley face. What she said reassured Lucy, and said in return: “Thanks Catriona, I’m glad to hear that . . . But those names . . . addressing you all this way just feels really off. I can’t—” The three girls giggled, interrupting her, which Catriona then pointed a fact, “Just like the days you blacken your hair. I admit! This feels weird too.” Lucy just shook her head when they brought that up again. She sighed a little when she then recalled something they agreed on.

She said to the girls: “It’s just hard to leave Emmet all on his own now, after all that just happened. I wish we had more time.” The girls understood her concern, so Cindy added to Catriona’s assurance, “Like you said, girl! It’ll all be worth it in the end! Plus, it’s gonna be fun! Just like old times!” Then the three gave Lucy a hug and said their goodbyes. “See you tomorrow, Lucy!” Cindy said as the three of them waved to Lucy, who waved back to them as she walked away to get to her motorbike.

Before she took her ride, she checked the pad to see which assignment she had to do next. She then saw that it was time to address Unikitty’s decorations, so she drove her way home.

* * *

The ride was pleasant going back. Traversing through the breezy mountainous terrains away from the city was always relaxing, and it also felt fun driving through a road that had a lot of rise and lows. While Emmet initially wanted to build their house together on a lot adjacent by the cul-de-sac, she thought it was a lot better out here; a private getaway setting.

As she drove, she noticed the sky was slowly turning orange, as the sun began to set. Just going through a few of these tasks on the list actually took a lot of time than she expected. Will she even have enough time left to monitor the decorations? They still have a dinner to prepare with friends after all.

She’ll just have to wait and see how things go from here.

But when she finally reached home and parked her motorbike on their front yard, she was baffled that she couldn’t open the front door, for it was locked from the inside.

“Unikitty? Can I come in?” she called, repeatedly knocking the door and turning the knob that was stuck.

. . . But there was no response.

“Everyone?” she called again, but there was nothing.

She waited for someone to open the door . . . but still nothing.

She then decided to peer through the side window, but the curtains were down, covering the view from within. This was really puzzling. She got no response from anyone, but only an eerie silence. Did Unikitty left the house or something? Who was watching Emmet?!

She quickly rushed to the bedroom window.

Thankfully, the curtains over there remain draped, and the room’s interior can be seen. However, she became stunned when she saw first thing that Emmet was missing on the bed.

“Emmet?!”

Slowly, she glanced away and looked around the whole bedroom. Once she really saw that the actual condition of the room was nothing like she remembered when she was here earlier, she became extremely tensed!

“Wha?! What in the world?!” she exclaimed in horror, but unable to utter in full volume.

In an instant, the back door of the kitchen immediately came to her mind, and hurried there to see if it wasn’t locked so she could get in to investigate . . . but still couldn’t. It was also locked! Scared of not knowing what’s happening inside, she panicked, turning the knob and knocking the door a lot harder this time, calling out loudly:

“Emmet?! Unikitty?! Can you hear me?! Let me in!!”

Then just a second sooner, she heard something ticked.

She turned the knob, thinking someone opened it, but it didn’t budge still.

Then she suddenly recalled that there was a matter of fact another door just around the corner, leading one out to the backyard porch where the double-decker couch swing was built in. That tick couldn’t be from there, could it?! Without delay, she ran there, parkoured over the porch railing, stomped hard on the floor, and reached to turn the knob.

Alas, her instincts were right. Someone did just lock this door! To think she could have just gone straight here a second sooner!

Things were getting really desperate. She needed to get in, but she knew then and there that she would have to do it by force. But she couldn’t just break in, kicking this door off its hinges, or doing something rash like it. That would be very disrespectful to her, to her Emmet, and to this house that was built for them.

So, she had a more domesticated idea.

She ran back to her motorbike, took out her keys that was a duplicate for the front door, and used it to get in . . .

. . . and then even I couldn’t fully describe what she felt right at that moment when she finally saw everything that just happened inside.

The living room was a mess. The whole kitchen was a wreck!

She noticed Unikitty and Emmet just standing completely still, staring right at her downright shocked, as they were carrying several bricks seemingly attempting to fix every broken wall, furniture and fixture. Lucy just batted her eyes, struggling to process all this, waiting for any one of them to start talking.

Emmet then uttered: “Oh, right . . . I forgot she had keys.”

“What happened in here?” Lucy asked, almost like a quiet whisper, for she was still processing her surroundings.

Was there another tremor that occurred while she was gone? She couldn’t be sure because no one said any word.

But then she began linking the dots when she soon caught her eye on the raptor that was right beside Emmet. In rising agitation, she said to him:

“This raptor couldn’t be responsible . . . Could it?”

That already sounded like an accusation. Emmet took it personally, and he felt threatened.

“Lucy, wait . . . I can explain—”

“Explain what Emmet?” she interrupted, “That a naturally-caused earthquake actually did all this?!”

He could sense that Lucy already knew what was really going on. Scratching his head in embarrassment, he admitted to her:

“. . . If only it could have been the tremors.”

Lucy became furious! But she instantly took a really deep breath to compose herself. Then calmly, she expressed her disappointment to him:

“I told you Emmet. We couldn’t let it stay here with us.”

“But Lucy, please, it was all an accident! He’s really innocent!” Emmet defended his raptor.

Unikitty sadly had to disagree and said:

“But it was about to eat me Emmet.”

“Yeah! You’re right! He went into an outrage, but he only mistook you for hurting me. He wouldn’t have done any of this if only he knew!” Emmet explained in anguish, which the Other One agreed, regretfully nodding towards Lucy.

In complete disbelief, she held herself back, not knowing what else to say. She just shook her head as she stared to-and-fro at him and the raptor.

“But . . . But don’t worry!” Emmet suddenly started, “We can fix this! We’re Master Builders! Everything will be put back into place in a jiffy!”

He then hastened to begin piling up more wreckage upon even more that was already on his arms. He placed more than he thought he could handle, and was so focused on trying to fix the problem, he carelessly forgot about the condition of his hands. Right away he felt a sharp jolt of pain and yelped! Accidentally letting all the heavy pile of bricks fall to hit his feet, he screeched even more! He jumped and skipped about, and stumbled down to the floor, making a lot of groaning noises, hissing in pain. He’s really making himself look so pitiful. Lucy just had to help him get up.

“You can’t Emmet, not when your hands are like that,” she reminded him.

Emmet was still gritting his teeth to the pain that was still lingering from his hands. He tried if he could fully open them, but the pain only intensified when he did. This didn’t look good. He began to feel distraught.

“N-No, I . . . I have to build this all back up! What about our dinner?!”

What could Lucy say at this point? It was already clear there wouldn’t be any more get-together tonight with this much damage. With none of them trying to console Emmet, he only grew more hopeless the more he looked around the mess, now realizing he couldn’t help to fix the situation anymore. He slowly gave into discouragement and looked down, really down. His lips quivered, tightly shutting his eyes, and began giving way to tears.

Lucy was totally aware that they’re in a really troubling situation right now, but she was actually more perplexed to why Emmet suddenly went sobbing. Why give into this much despair? This was not the most hopeless situation they’ve ever been through together, so this really didn’t feel so right.

It was now time for answers.

She wanted him to talk, more honestly this time, about what’s really going on, so she said: “Emmet?” very softly, as she slowly rubbed his back, feeling pity for him, all the while confused.

“I’m . . . I’m sorry . . .” Emmet whimpered, tears sliding down from his eyes, “I’m so sorry Lucy . . . Unikitty . . . the Other One . . . I’m really, really sorry . . .”

Lucy just continued rubbing his back for he was crying more intensely. This confused her further, but she stayed silent, waiting for him to let it out more.

“I . . . I just wanted Rex to come back . . . and hang out with us like we used to . . . I missed my **vest** friend . . .” Emmet cried, sniffing loudly and swiping his tears off with his left arm.

This was rather strange for Lucy to hear, admittedly. She recalled her own concern about him hanging out with Rex too much, but to actually see him sobbing like this when it’s actually happening, it distressed her. She asked concerningly, even more perplexed:

“Did something happen? Has he done something . . . b-bad?”

“**YEAH, he did!**” Emmet snapped, causing her and the rest to widen their eyes in shock.

He lashed out:

“He doesn’t want to **TALK** to me anymore!

. . . And . . .

And I don’t know why . . . “

That sudden burst of anger caused the rest to shut up. Lucy even stopped rubbing his back, letting him go. She then glanced at Unikitty, and she did the same to her, looking at each other very worried.

Then Emmet continued speaking rashly with rapid gesturing:

“I **tried **inviting Rex so we could all start over. I **thought** the Other One being present would help him feel less intimidated. I **hoped** that all of us being together would remind him that he still has friends, but . . .

B-But look what happened?!

All my plans went **ka-BOOM!!**

EVERYTHING’s ruined!

Gone! KAPUT!!

I only made a HUGE MESS of things!

And even **I** dragged you all into this!

I feel **dumb**! I feel **stupid**!

A-And I’m **tired**!!

I can’t even feel my hands, guys! You hear me?! **I CAN’T**!!

. . . A-At least not really . . .”

Emmet started calming down, but everyone else just stood back really shaken up by his wild talk. Literally no one at this point has ever seen and heard Emmet this pent up in anger. Lucy took all of this very concerningly. She never fully discerned that he had been this stressed. It was more than she ever realized.

Then they heard Emmet giving out a really heavy sigh, head brought down so low with a defeated expression, and said really sadly:

> “I . . . I just want everything to be awesome again . . . just like it used to . . .”

Unikitty broke the awkward silence and said:

“You know what, Emmet . . . Rex hasn’t talked to me too.”

“Isn’t this why I bothered inviting you in the first place?” Emmet reminded her with a hint of an upset tone. “No, what I mean it . . . he doesn’t really enjoy talking to me like he used to,” she continued. “That’s because you don’t hang out with him anymore, isn’t it?” he accused her. “No! It’s not like that, Emmet! I did nothing! I was just being my usual self, you know, cheering everyone up and being all positive. It worked before. You know that pretty well,” she explained. “So . . . he’s not . . . talking to you too? How about you, Lucy?” Emmet turned to her, which caught her off guard and hesitated.

“He . . . W-We haven’t talked for a long while too, that’s for sure.”

Unikitty interfered, saying: “Do you all know that feeling . . . when you want to hang out with somebody, but when you approach that person, you get that weird . . . repelling vibe from him? And that feeling turned out to be true? That’s honestly how it’s like when Rex’s around, at least for me . . .” Emmet was completely perplexed to hear them saying all this. He uttered in disbelief: “He’s avoiding all of you? I thought he was avoiding just **me**. Why is he avoiding anyone of us? The Other One?” The raptor only shrugged, admitting it didn’t know why.

He then took time to seriously ponder what he just heard from them. He knew there was something more to Rex not wanting to hang with them anymore other than being too occupied with his own stuff and his raptors. He seemed right all along.

“Why is he avoiding my friends? Even me? . . . What has gotten into him?” he thought.

All these facts coming together eventually caused him to make a firm decision. He then sniffed his last, wiped the remaining tears off from his face, and looked very determinedly to all of them, saying:

“Now more than ever we need to keep this get-together going!”

“But Emmet,” Lucy interrupted him, “We can’t accommodate anyone right now.”

“Change of plans, Lucy . . . again,” he sighed in disappointment, but quickly picked himself up and continued more sternly: “We’ll have dinner at the usual place we used to hang out together with the rest of our friends . . . that included Rex.”

“Emmet,” Lucy once again spoke up, “I just want to say that I totally understand your plight, but I can’t help be concerned. You still need your rest, and you have another packed day tomorrow! Are you sure wanna do this? Tonight?”

“. . .”

“. . . Lucy?”

Emmet suddenly went closer and placed both his hands onto her shoulders, looking straight to her eyes. Lucy got a much clearer view of how genuinely worried and determined he really is. Despite not being his best shape right now, she sensed that he already made up his mind. She then heard him ask in a serious manner:

“Do you still remember what we **both** agreed on? Back at planet Undar?”

She took a deep sigh before returning back to look at him in concern.

She answered him:

“Yeah . . . I remember.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now that you have gone this far in this story, have you ever bothered wondering how Rex actually never disappeared here in this fic, unlike what actually happened in the TLM2 movie?
> 
> Well, Emmet mentioned something in the end of this chapter, and you are going to find out in detail. =3
> 
> Onward to the next chapter! ^w^


	9. Chapter 9

###  **CHAPTER 09**

_ "Goodbye!"_

_A bright, pink explosion blew right in front of him the moment he touched the Heart Bomb, totally covered in ashes. Such a close contact with that explosion destroyed his time-travel controller to a rubble; in complete shock, he fell to the floor, temporarily paralyzed, but shortly able to move again. However, his shocked expression changed to a face that had lost all hope. This sudden turn of events finally made him realize that it was now all over; he failed his mission . . . and he knew at that moment what his ultimate fate would be . . ._

_He heard the sound of someone's footsteps coming toward him. It stopped, and he heard a voice, saying:_

> _"It's over Rex! Emmet is never gonna be you." It was Lucy's voice._

_He struggled to get up just to see her up front; he also saw Emmet right beside her, taking off the Rex-vest he gave him, and threw it away, swiping his hair back to its neat style. Lucy was happy to see Emmet do just that, and was deeply proud of him. Seeing this made it all very clear; this is the Emmet she fell in love with, the kind she came back for, who was nothing like who he is now. No longer anymore._

_For many agonizing years, he held onto resentment that completely changed him, but all he ended up becoming was someone terrible: like a murderer, who so hardened his heart that it no longer felt any remorse towards anyone. By travelling back in time to cause Arma-ma-geddon, he really showed that he cared about no one but himself. It even reached to a point where he almost assulted Emmet . . . because that's how much he came to hate who he used to be. He thought he had become the best version of himself . . . but no . . . He only became a bad guy._

_All this came to his mind in a matter of a second . . ._

_He finally came to understand what **real **regret feels like . . ._

> _"But you can be like him," he heard Lucy say, referring 'him' as Emmet, "you don't have to be 'the bad guy'."_

_. . . Is that . . ._

_. . . Is that even possible at this point?_

_He already knew it was all too late for him now . . ._

_When she managed to rescue Emmet right here in planet Undar, she did something that was literally impossible because his own Lucy from his timeline never rescued him when he was trapped in the same planet for many years. This caused a critical inconsistency in the stream of time. She changed its course. His timeline broke off, and is gonna be replaced with this new one; the old one would soon cease to exist, taking everything from it to disappear along with it . . . including himself._

_Guess this is how his life story ends . . ._

_How his journey to become this version of himself was a terrible decision that he now wished he had never travelled through in the first place . . ._

_He then heard Emmet say something that was pointless:_

_"You can join us!"_

_"I . . . I-I can't . . ." he admitted, as he got up struggling in pain._

_"What do you mean?" Emmet asked, not understanding why he refused such an offer._

> _He explained: "She came back for ya'. You're never gonna turn out . . . l-like me, which means . . ." he sighed in defeat before he said, "I'm never gonna exist."_

_"Wait . . . Wait, No!"_

_Emmet suddenly witnessed his words coming true; Rex's right hand went transparent, the rest of his right arm shortly followed, slowly disappearing into nothing._

_"Ha ha! Look! I told ya'! I knew it! Look! I'm back-to-the-futuring! Totally called it," Rex tried his hardest to simply laugh this out, but seeing this was only distressing to Emmet._

_"What's 'back-to-the-futuring'?!" Emmet cried in confusion._

_"It's a classic movie older kids get to watch!" Rex struggled to continue explaining, as the changing effect of time slowly consumed him. Painfully glancing on his left leg that just faded away, he went straight to the point, woefully saying: "and now . . . it's happening to me . . ."_

_The more Emmet saw him disappearing, the more he felt alarmed that he needed to reach out and said:_

_"Come on! Take our hand while you still have a hand to take!"_

_Rex did not see this coming; the person he tried to kill a minute ago was inviting him to take his hand in an attempt to save him. Emmet was serious! After every villainous thing he did, he wasn't giving up on him!_

_Oh, how much had he forgotten what was like to be him . . ._

_As much as he already accepted his own fate, Emmet's offer felt tempting to consider. He stared at his open hand, beginning to change his mind, and wanted to stay and live instead . . ._

_but it was just simply futile . . ._

_Even if he did take his hand, what Lucy already did for Emmet was completely irreversible at this point._

_He knew he'd just run out of time if he bothered helping Emmet to understand all this time travel mumbo jumbo, so he refused to take it. As sad and bleak as it is, he refused to take his hand, and just said:_

_"Ya' dunno it how it works, kid."_

_"Rex!" Emmet yet insisted, calling out to him, swaying his hand, wanting him to take it. In Emmet's ignorance, he hoped that would change his fate somehow, but Rex knew better. Nevertheless, he was already convinced of his dire outcome._

_He didn't want Emmet to worry about him anymore, so he reassured him, chuckling and smiling as hard as he can:_

> _"It's okay. I'm **proud** of ya' . . ._
> 
> _. . . and you're gonna grow up to be better than me."_

_Even though Emmet heard him well, it was becoming way too unsettling the moment he saw Rex lost all his legs at this point. He panicked! He rushed to grab his last remaining hand, and cried:_

_"Rex, please! This is not how it ends. At least, not for you!"_

_Rex got startled by that sudden move of his, but he was just not convinced. Time was beyond their control. Nothing in the universe was gonna set this right, even if any of them really wanted to . . . but Emmet's concern was starting to rub off on him. He began to wish he could stay . . . but who is Emmet that he could change all this?_

_He's just a mere construction worker._

_This won't work._

_He looked upon Emmet's hand grabbing hold onto his, which slowly began to fade away too, until Emmet was holding onto nothing._

_"Listen, Emmet . . ."_

_Rex began, looking at Emmet who was slowly expressing despair,_

> _"You can do nothing for me, but . . ._
> 
> _but you can move on, and live right . . ._
> 
> _don't make the same mistakes I did . . ._
> 
> _. . . you'd do that for me, will ya'?"_

_Rex gave him his best reassuring smile, wanting Emmet to stop trying to help him. But to Emmet, this was just another way of him saying goodbye. This was not even a good kind of farewell. He's fading out of existence for crying out loud!_

_Emmet saw past it. He saw what was more to Rex's smile that he was trying so hard to show because it was rather clear on his face, that it actually had a lot of regret in it. If only Rex could be helped, but he had no idea how. Seeing Rex with nothing left but his torso and head visible, he became discouraged. Time was running out. He couldn't save him. He teared up. _

_Rex couldn't bare to face Emmet like this, thus he turned to Lucy and entrusted her saying:_

> _"Lucy . . . look out for him . . . He needs you . . . more than ya' might realize."_

_She didn't take this lightly as much as Emmet did. She too perceived beyond Rex's words that he was genuinely sorry. She saw that stare of his, even with all that stubble and chiseled features, that it finally resembled Emmet's innocence; only it was a sad kind of stare, a stare one would look like if one was desperate for mercy. By saving her Emmet, it cost his life. This was really an aching sight . . . because she too couldn't save him._

_She could only say to him in pity:_

_"You could have stayed with us . . . We could have helped you to change."_

_If only Rex could have a second chance, he would have wanted to do so. That thought hurt him deep, feeling very disappointed that he couldn't. This caused a sudden change of thought. He began to think his fate was unfair; he now desired to stay with them, even if it was impossible to be a reality. That desire only heightened when he suddenly got himself a gentle hug from Emmet, completely taken off by surprise, and heard him whimper:_

_"If only you wouldn't go . . ._

_we would be brothers . . ._

_and you won't have to be alone anymore . . ."_

_And that . . . was the final blow. He felt a big crack right in the gut! Those words finally cracked his hardened heart! His emotions got loose and surfaced through. It began to ran wild, as he focused his thought on that promise Emmet and Lucy just made. It reminded him of the hope, that same hope he willingly left behind many years ago, that his friends would come back to save him. Right now, events have mirrored, and Rex realized this; Lucy being here with Emmet together, trying to save him from his fate, he could see it! He could see that hope finally coming true right before his eyes!_

_At last he could relish that feeling, that delightful feeling of his innermost heart's desire and his longing becoming real. It was the key that finally opened his heart wide, and it caused him to break down in tears._

_. . . If only he could hug Emmet back to express his bittersweet joy, but with his arms gone, he could only lean his head on Emmet's shoulder._

_In the final moments of his life, he finally experienced what's like to be cared for again. His quest for revenge and personal justification no longer mattered. All his anger melted away, and he could finally let go of all his resentment. Then in an instant, his recent actions of causing Arma-ma-geddon came back to his mind, and he suddenly became very grieved. He wept bitterly to that thought. He regretted it all. He knew he had to change. He needed to make amends. He desired to become good again. He would do it no matter how much it would take. Even if that would take a lot of time, a lot of effort, and even a lot of pain!_

_. . . He finally made up his mind that he would do just that!_

_In his deep emotional anguish, he hugged Emmet very tightly, not wanting to leave anymore. He wanted to stay with them. He wanted a second chance in life!_

_Emmet really felt that tight hug so well . . ._

_. . . But that didn't feel right!_

_"E-Emmet! LOOK!!"_

_He heard Lucy exclaiming in complete disbelief to what she just saw. But Rex was just not budging. He still hugged Emmet as tightly as he could. He forgot his own strength; he was already squishing Emmet so hard._

_"W-Wow! Looks like . . . s-someone's a really tight hugger!"_

_Emmet struggled, yet gently tapping Rex's back, wanting to let go. Rex questioned his statement, and opened his eyes to see first thing his own two hands visibly hugging Emmet. That startled him! He quickly broke away from hugging. Emmet flinched, but yet, chuckling in absolute relief._

_"NO! No way!"_

_Rex couldn't believe he saw his own two hands and arms visibly whole again. He looked down and also saw his two legs and feet, fidgeting them simultaneously._

_"I'm . . . I'm hallucinating . . . Ha ha! . . . This couldn't be . . . This not possible! This makes no sense! Tell me you're seeing this! You're seeing this right?!"_

_Rex's expression just went from utter disbelief to blissful gratitude. Emmet was just as unsure as he is, but he was more overjoyed to see that he never ceased to exist after all. Whatever Rex said about time and back-to-the-futuring went nonsense! He rushed to give Rex another hug, a tighter one this time, exclaiming in joy:_

_"You're here! You're still here!! I'm so happy for you Rex!"_

_Rex was lost in all this joy, and hugged Emmet the same way, laughing in tears. He looked up to see Lucy, and she too was just as joyfully surprised as they all are. He then looked upon his own hands, wanting to make sure he wasn't just seeing things, for he was so sure seconds ago that he'd be a goner by now. This was all too good to be true!_

** _  
_ **

* * *

_ "_It has been a year that Rex bothered recalling when it all started; he looked upon his own two hands the same way, flipping them back and forth, wondering to a thought that he himself cannot answer till this day. Why **didn't** he disappear when he should've? Is it possible he may have overlooked something? It sure didn't make any sense . . . Maybe he should start re-watching some of his favorite movies that featured some time-travel gimmicks. They might shed some light or something.

Nevertheless, he was still thankful that he didn't. He could have been as good as dead, but he got his second chance instead. A second chance . . . to set things right . . .

He then let out a deep sigh, disappointingly recalling how things have been lately for him . . . He's supposed to be in a really peppy mood with all of his friends, especially with the anniversary in mind, but he was still very inclined to not show up at Emmet's house for dinner with them. He mumbled to himself as he faced his reflection in the mirror right in front of him:

"Rex, why are you **not** doing this?! Is this what ya' want?! To be all alone again?!"

"Dude! You have your raptors with ya'!"

"I know, I know! It's just that things have been all samey, and . . . ugh . . . why am I just talking to a freakin' mirror?"

He snapped out of that sobering feeling.

Then, he immediately readjusted his thick, blue gloves, trying to fit it more comfortably. He only just wore his whole Rex casual attire. What was left on the hanger now was his Rex vest, so he grabbed it, put it on, and looked again at himself in the mirror.

He suddenly smiled at himself . . . because he looked great, especially with that rad vest on, just as he always liked it. Then his smile changed to a smirk, delightfully chuckling to his own appearance, and enjoying the sight of how handsome he is. Resting his hands on his waist, he expressed an egotistical grin, playfully raising his eyebrows . . . But it didn't take any second longer for him to lose hold onto that confidence though. Quickly, his face dropped to a discontented expression, letting out a really unsatisfied sigh. He could see it. He could compare it. Things haven't been so awesome like how it all started out. It's been . . . pretty lonely . . . even with his raptors always being around for him.

"Rex . . ." he uttered to himself, "you've been away from them for far too long . . ."

"More like **THEY've **been away from **me** for far too—"

"Wait! Wait! Stop!" he shook himself, holding his head firmly,

"It doesn't matter . . . It's fine! It'll be fine!

I'll just have to go to that stupid dinner!

Everything will be back like it used to be, right?! Is that what'cha want?!"

He had to stop looking at the mirror now, for he was inclining to punch it in frustration. He faced away towards the glass wall of his gym, and through it, he noticed that the sky was already turning twilight. It was getting really late. "Oh shoot!" He immediately rushed out from there and went straight to his spacious garage. With a big house like his, that actually took quite some time. As soon as he got in, he tapped onto a nearby button for the steel door to slide open, revealing a steel-made tunnel sloping upwards that led outside, and jumped right into one of his parked vehicles; he chose to use his four-seater pick-up truck.

Before he could step on the accelerator after starting the engines, Ripley suddenly barged into the garage, calling out to him as it held something that was vibrating, but Rex failed to notice his raptor in his haste, and just drove off into the road before Ripley could reach him, leaving it in the dust.

_"Wow, man, I should just duct tape his phone right on his hands from now on!" _Ripley got angered; its response being translated for you.

_ "_It was getting darker by the minute. After passing through the bridge, he switched the beam on to lit his way. He made sure he wouldn't get anywhere near the city downtown as he headed towards Emmet's house, so as soon as he reached to a fork in the road, he chose the one that led to the mountains. There's rarely ever traffic in this trek he's maneuvering through, enabling him to speed up as fast as he could. Still, Emmet's place was still far off. He lived many mountains away from him. Many minutes later, he could finally see that puny house on the other mountain from where he's now at.

He could only hope that being a late comer won't be anything too awkward. He immediately started imagining his friend's reactions . . . It will not be a pretty sight. Maybe he could call Emmet to wait for him outside, so he'll lead the way. But when he checked on his pocket and felt nothing was there, he wondered where he could have placed his phone. Was it somewhere in the truck? He checked about every nook and cranny near where he sat, but it just wasn't there.

"Where is that darn phone?!"

Until he arrived at Emmet's front yard, he still couldn't find his phone. However, his attention was caught so suddenly by the scenery around here, noticing how . . . unusually empty it seemed to be.

There were no other vehicles parked in, other than Lucy's motorbike. Was he actually early? The stars were already out. Everybody should have arrived by now. He observed the house from the outside that there was still light being turned on inside, however, minimal. He then cautiously parked his truck, and then later got off. He walked about the yard, looking around confused.

"Where is everybody?"

With the sound of the truck's engine gone, he could actually listen to how quiet everything's around here, only hearing the nearby crickets. He then slowly walked towards the front porch, passing by Lucy's motorbike. That instantly caused him to realize another strange thing.

"Wait! Where's that puny car Emmet has? He's not here either? They couldn't be this late from . . . groceries, could they? That's not like them."

If the silence and the lack of attendance was weird enough, things just got weirder that he couldn't even open the front door. "What the? It's locked!" he stubbornly turned the knob about, thinking he maybe mistaken, but it wouldn't budge. "Hey, anyone home? It's me, Rex!" he called and knocked. It was eerie he got no response at all. It really looked like he's the only one around here. If only he had his phone with him, he could have known their whereabouts.

"Ugh . . . now what?"

He was sure that somebody might be inside. He could see the living room was lit, judging from the side window, even though its curtains were down. "Did Emmet forgot to invite the others?" he said annoyed, fully knowing it would be really stupid if he did. This was indeed an odd situation to have a nice get-together with friends . . . when it’s pretty empty around here.

Then finally, he heard footsteps coming from inside, but . . . they're unusually louder, almost sounded like stomps. Those were the kind of foot noise he's already way too familiar with. He could NOT be wrong.

"The Other One?!"

He suddenly remembered his other raptor, who moved here to be with Emmet since yesterday. He knocked a little loudly after not getting any response, and called: "Hey boy, I know you're in there. Let me in!"

Not long enough, the door opened, and it was indeed the raptor, but the door only opened wide enough for its head to peek out. "Oh, great! You're here!" he said in relief, and asked in a rush, "Where are the gang? What's going on?" but the raptor hesitated to explain. It slowly went back inside, but Rex just won’t allow himself to be locked out again in the dark, so he barged in. Then he tensed up right in the spot when he finally saw everything that actually happened in here.

"Wh-What the—?!"

Rex couldn’t believe what he saw, and he didn’t want this to be true. The Other One was just standing behind him, looking down and fidgeting its claws. Rex heard the raptor moping, a really clear sign to him that his raptor was guilty of all the mess he’s seeing. In panic, he faced it and exclaimed:

"Don't tell me you did all this, DON’T TELL ME!!”

The raptor went along. It shook its head, not admitting instead.

"STOP PLAYING WITH ME, Other One!

I TOLD ya' to behave no matter the cost!!

I'M gonna get **killed **because of you!!”

It pouted in annoyance when Rex said that, uttering a low growl.

“Okay, okay, I'm overexaggerating!” Rex admitted, gnashing his teeth, gesturing like he pushed something down to the floor right in front of the raptor’s face.

Then at the next second, the two heard from the outside engine sounds coming towards the yard. They peeked through the slightly opened front door to check who it was. They saw Emmet's car coming in. The beam light hitting them diffused their view from seeing who was actually driving. Then, as soon as the car parked, and the driver turned the beam off, it became clear through the windshields.

"Oh darn, it's Wyldstyle!" Rex whispered nervously.

Rex immediately shut the door, and quickly piled up the fallen bricks all over the living room and began fixing the place all by himself. He was in a fit! There were walls and column on every corner that needed repairs, and some furniture that needed fixing. Some even needed a complete overhaul. The Other One couldn’t do anything to help for not being a Master Builder. Although, it observed how Rex quickly and _properly_ he was able to cover up some of the broken walls, and especially how _accurate_ he was able to build them back in their proper places. He even got two sofas and its accompanying table repaired just right. Soon enough, Rex fixed some of the hollows of the walls, and one of the broken columns were stabilized in its place; all in the matter of seconds . . . yet, even that wasn’t enough for him to fix everything in the living room.

When he was in an attempt to rebuild the wrecked bookshelf, Lucy finally entered, and just stared at him unamusingly. She already saw him earlier peeking through the door with his raptor from the car, and it was obvious he was trying to fix every mess his raptor made. She cleared her throat loudly to catch his attention, and he quickly stopped rebuilding the bookshelf, letting it go in its place. He faced her and stood straight, giving her a really awkward smile. Lucy just continued staring, and Rex just held onto his position.

This situation was definitely a lot worse than just being a late comer to a gathering.

Lucy’s unamused glare was intimidating. Rex felt really embarrassed; he slowly gave in and looked down, but holding to his smile as hard as he can. On the floor by his foot, he then noticed a broken brick. He immediately kicked it away, harshly hitting the bookshelf that he was about to fix, and it collapsed on him.

The raptor just covered its eyes by its palms at this point.

Rex quickly got his head out from the rubble, and saw Lucy went even more unamused. He then shoved all of the rubble off and ran to her.

"Wyldstyle, I can explain—"

"CAN IT, REX!" she interrupted him by her palm, and he flinched. "It’s no wonder why you still haven’t showed up. You didn’t read the message, did you?”

"There . . . There was?" he raised his eyebrow.

"Well, just look around. Do you think **this** is a great place for all of us to hang out? It should have been!" she gestured her arm around the messy room while meanly staring at him.

Rex gulped, then spoke:

“I . . . I, uh . . . it . . . could have been worse? Look! I fixed some for ya’.”

"Never mind all this! You're supposed to be heading to the buffet by now. You really didn’t bother checking your phone? He’s been trying to reach you for an hour,” she complained.

". . . I must have misplaced it somewhere," he admitted, as he checked on all of his pockets for his phone that wasn't there.

"Great!" she said it sarcastically, "Now that I found you, stop wasting time! You’re the only one left we’re waiting.”

“. . . And here I thought I was early,” he muttered and sighed.

Before Lucy went back outside, she grabbed her scarf that was left hanging on a clothing stand near the front door and wore it on. That went along with her sleeveless black shirt with blue and pink markings, for she already changed to her causal ensemble before her, Emmet and Unikitty left earlier.

"B-But what about your house?” Rex asked in concern.

Without turning her head to face him, she replied sternly as she was now heading towards Emmet’s car:

"I'll take care of it when this is all over with. Let's just go.

. . . Oh, before I forget . . . you should probably take your raptor home tomorrow.

It has done plenty enough.”

That hurt him deep. Rex blamed himself for what the raptor did because he felt he was responsible, even though this was not his idea. To think he hoped he would have a great time with his friends tonight, but after this . . . it sure seemed like it’s not gonna go very well. He really felt like backing out, but at the same time he couldn’t, like he was trapped in the situation. The Other One could notice Rex was intensely bothered, with a really droopy face. It rubbed its head on his head, wanting to comfort him, and he took it. As he gently petted the raptor’s head by his hand, he said silently:

“I’m okay, big guy.

Just . . . Just come with me.”

Rex wasn’t okay at all. He had to come up with some idea to remedy this situation somehow. He couldn’t leave things like this. Pretty sure she must have already given a mouthful to Emmet, and he certainly didn’t want his raptor left behind like this by itself. That’s why he wanted his raptor to come. The Other One was actually oblivious as to why it was wanted, but it didn’t hesitate to follow Rex. He suddenly called Lucy before she could get into the car:

“Hey! Wyldstyle! Wait a minute!"

She stopped to hear him out, but not looking back to face him still. He then said:

"Look, I just wanna say sorry to ya' after everything my raptor did back there, so . . . I'm taking him with me tonight and—"

"Wait, what?!” she suddenly became upset and turned to face him, “You can’t bring that raptor with us. It's gonna make trouble!"

"No! I'm taking him **home** tonight. That’s what I meant! He's gonna ride on the back of my truck and . . . I ask you to ride with us too. It’s the least I could do,” he compensated.

Lucy didn’t want to accept that offer, so she turned away rolling her eyes, and went to open the driver’s seat of Emmet’s car without uttering a word.

"Lucy, please?” Rex genuinely begged, calling her by her real name this time,

“Just let me do this?

. . . I am sorry.”

His tone was a lot like Emmet, and that caught her attention. She still didn’t face him, but she was already starting to reconsider. Recalling what she said to Rex back at planet Undar a year ago, thanks to Emmet’s reminder earlier, she made her decision and straight up told Rex:

"Fine.”

She then closed the door, and went to his truck. Yet, Rex took it personally when he saw her entering in the back seat, instead of sitting beside him as he drives. Even though she agreed to accept the ride, she was still bitter about what happened . . . but he actually felt like there might be more to it than that.

He then signaled his raptor to get on the back of the truck now, and then he went to his own driver's seat. Putting his seatbelt on, he started the engines, and then soon drove towards downtown . . . not liking this new plan even by a smidge . . . and that’s not even the end of it.

Throughout the minute, there was no conversation.

Just silence. The awkward silence.

That really bothered Rex a lot more than admitting he was responsible earlier. It was already tough enough for him to fight against tendencies to not be present with them for dinner, now he had to deal with this. Someone needed to break the ice. Nervously, he took a look at Lucy through the rearview mirror. She was facing at the window, leaning on her wrist as that arm leaned onto the door handle, with a face that looked like there was a lot on her mind. He then tried asking:

"So, Wyldstyle . . . how have ya' been?

. . . I hardly see ya' anymore, so . . ."

Rex said that as bluntly as it gets. He was not ignorant to the fact that they haven’t seen each other in months. He knew that there was something more to Lucy’s bitter attitude beyond what his raptor just did to their home. He hoped she would talk about it, but there came a long gap before she replied back to him unenthusiastically:

"I'm fine."

She didn’t want to talk. It was painfully clear. Completely unsure of how to continue the conversation with a reply like that, he just drove on, slowly losing hope if this dinner time with friends might even turn out to be worth it after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It took me this long to finally write that dinner chapter that's been hinted since Chapter 2 xD
> 
> How will all this turn out? o.o  
The following chapter will finally start this whole thing!
> 
> I hope all of you are enjoying this story so far. It has been a really interesting ride to write this story this much already! ^w^
> 
> It started with a little fanart, and later this whole big mess. XDD


	10. Chapter 10

###  **CHAPTER 10**

"Are three pieces enough for you Emmet, or do you want me to get some more?" Unikitty made sure, as she placed his plate of tasty, choco-filled waffles on Emmet's side of the table. Considering his condition, he couldn't be more grateful for her assistance, and said. "This is fine. I wouldn't want to tire you. I'm kind of responsible why we're here, and my hands . . . they kind of need a big break." He was embarrassed by his situation, showing an awkward smile to her and the other two that were present with them, whom were Benny and Metalbeard. Nevertheless, Benny said to him energetically: “Don’t sweat it! This place is still great!” as he chowed down on his plate filled with various munchies and crackers. “I agree with Benny,” Unikitty reassured Emmet, “What matters is that we’re all here together . . . Well, except for Wyldstyle and Rex . . . but they’ll be here soon! I’m sure!” but mentioning them only made Emmet sigh in worry. Then he leaned his arm on the table, rested his head on his wrist, and expressed his concern:

"If only Rex would just pick up our calls for once . . . I’m starting to think he never even bothered coming."

“Well, if Wyldstyle was right all along, she would have seen Rex at your house, that he really did want to come. Maybe he just missed the message, you know? They should probably be on their way here now.”

What Unikitty guessed was right all along. A second sooner, Emmet received a text from Lucy confirming everything she just guessed. She then prodded him and said: “Told ya!” with a wink, and Emmet just sighed in relief. He then confessed to his friends: “Guys, I am sorry for being a little whiny about all this, but I couldn’t help but feel bad for Rex that he’s missing out. I just wanted all of us to hang out together again like we used to.”

“If only Batman and Watevra were here, things could have been a little livelier,” said Benny.

“You’re right. Oh, and don’t forget about Sweet! She’s been pretty busy with her general duties too. She hardly had plenty of time to hang out with any of us. Maybe we should do some sleepover sometimes in the queen’s palace when they all come back home. It’ll be fun!” Unikitty added, seemingly sounded cheery by that idea.

“Eww . . . maybe for you and your girl talks,” Benny uttered in disgust.

On the contrary, Metalbeard was quite intrigued about something else in mind. Ever since he got here, he’s been pondering about the things he just heard from Emmet and Lucy about what happened to them on the site. As he tapped his chin, and couldn’t avoid his sight on Emmet’s bandaged hands, he wanted to clarify something and asked: "So, ye got yerself hurt by doin’ . . . a Master Breaker, was it? That was a big risk ye just did." Benny couldn’t agree more, “Yeah, Emmet. That was just dangerous—"

"Dangerous? Pfft! Not at all!” Emmet interrupted Benny, “This is just one of the many things . . . _I _was taught . . . just in case I needed to use it to save anyone, b-but I actually have no sentimentality over this stuff. What just happened was on the spur-of-the-moment! Don't think so otherwise.”

"Aye! Ye shouldn't think that, lad. Its only just to destroy stuff! Never ever is it a thing among we Master Builders," said Metalbeard, sharing his own thoughts, which Benny supported, "You sure did ‘save_’_ us when you used that same trick in destroying Batman and Watevera’s wedding! Didn’t Rex teach you that?"

"Guys . . . that was actually **my** idea. Not his."

Emmet struggled to be honest here. It was an unpleasant reminder, even though he was being manipulated by someone whom he now calls his brother. He thought that idea would save his friends back then, but all it ended up doing was just a disaster. Then glancing Emmet’s hands in pity, Benny asked him: "Can you even still build spaceships with hands like that?" Emmet knew the answer, and it wasn’t a good one. He just sighed in regret to the realization that he couldn’t. "Hey, hey!" Unikitty interrupted, "Emmet has gone through a lot today! What happened at the site was just one thing. Let's not make him feel worse than he already is."

"It's okay, Unikitty, really,” Emmet assured her, trying hard to show a smile, “I may not be able to build anything in a few days, but at least the job I got doesn't have to be building-related like what you all have; no decorations, nor spaceships, nor . . . whatever the queen asked you to do, Metalbeard."

“Ye will know when ye get a word from the fox,” Metalbeard stated.

Talking about work also reminded Emmet of something he was regretful for. He faced Unikitty, saying: "By the way, I'm sorry we ran out of time to even check out your decor—"

"Don't worry about it!" she interrupted him, not wanting him to apologize further, "I’m just glad Dr. Fox gave me a good report today. With that being said, she would still really appreciate it if you meet her by tomorrow first thing. She’s been wanting to discuss with you about that one decoration she's particularly working on . . . On an unrelated note, are you sure this place isn't too cold for you, Emmet? Wyldstyle just had to return home just to grab something she forgot she needed. She was feeling rather chilly since she got here."

"Last minute changes, my bad,” Emmet blamed himself, but decided to utter a little giggle. “But yeah, I'm feeling alright. What I'm wearing is just fine," he reassured her, saying his blue polo shirt was just comfortable enough for the cold.

All this long talk finally made him wanting to enjoy his waffles for now. As much as he wanted to eat it in bare hands, he rather wouldn’t want the bandages to get dirty, so he had to slice and fork it. However, his weakened hands caused him to use his utensils very carelessly, taking him longer to even have a bite. Then he noticed the knife he’s holding suddenly levitated and did their own thing, slicing the pancakes into pieces, and forked onto one of them. That was Unikitty’s doing.

“Okay, this is embarrassing,” Emmet chuckled, but he was grateful to her nonetheless.

* * *

It was good that Rex and Lucy didn't take long enough for them to reach the building where the restaurant is located. After parking his truck by the sidewalk near the entrance, Lucy went out ahead of him without a word, not even bothering to wait for him. Rex couldn’t bear this cold shoulder she’s giving. He wondered if the rest of her friends would even consider treating him any differently. As much as he wouldn’t want to admit it . . . he was starting to regret coming into this little gathering.

"Fingers crossed Emmet . . . fingers crossed," he grumbled.

He checked upon his raptor at the back of the truck, and it seemed to have fallen asleep while on the ride. That seemed good. At least it wouldn’t even be aware he was ever gone, or somehow wander off and cause some more trouble. Still, he petted its head as it snored, and said silently: "This shouldn’t take long, big guy. We'll be home very soon."

Eventually, Rex finally gathered the courage to step into the building. It has been a long time since he was here last. Yet, he could still remember the restaurant to be somewhere up on the 50th floor; it was one of the higher class all-you-can-eat buffet that had a great variety of food, and also a spectacular view of the city from within.

Despite being in a somewhat populated place, he was all by himself in the lobby and reception area. Lucy was nowhere to be seen. He noticed the elevator just ahead had already went up the lift, judging by the rising digital floor numbers. She must have already taken the ride without him; so much for trying to escort her so he'd somehow make up for what happened. He only felt hurt, and he was getting sick of it.

He complained:

"Where's Emmet when you need 'em . . ."

While on his way to the elevator to catch up, his attention was caught onto one of the few passersby . . . He was not liking how some of them were looking at him. It was a sight that he feared, almost like that dream he had last night . . . or rather, a nightmare.

Those eerie glare.

He knew this would still happen as soon as he’d step into this city again. The way people perceived him had not really changed till this day. It was daunting! And their added whispers were not helping him one bit.

He suddenly rubbed his arm in a nervous habit. His posture slowly exude insecurity. He couldn't bring himself to look up as he walked towards the elevator. He just realized he had to wait for the next lift to get to the resto. That would take quite a while . . . shouldn’t be a big deal . . .

. . . but more and more people came to wait along with him. Their presence only made Rex more antsy. His mind got stuck to the thought of them staring at him from behind, imagining all their whispers, all their voices. He started to panic; his feet began to fidget; he suddenly felt like bolting!

He imagined how worse this would get if he rode with all of them, stuck inside that confining elevator. If climbing up the stairs was a better option just to avoid this exact situation, he would really do just that!

* * *

"Hey, Wyldstyle’s back!” pointed Benny.

When Benny was on his way to grab some more grub, he caught sight of Lucy who just entered the restaurant. Once she got near to their table, Unikitty could clearly see she was now wearing her scarf, so she smiled and called to her: "So, are you now warm enough?” Lucy only nodded to her, smiling; she just went straight to sit beside Emmet, and suddenly was offered a slice of chocolate cake with icy-looking covered frosting. She heard Emmet say with his mouth full of it: “Hey Lucy, do you wanna try this?”

“Is that . . . ice cream cake?” she asked, almost looking repulsed by it.

“Oh Wyldstyle! Try it! It’s really great!” Unikitty said to her excitedly, and rambled: “I’ve been dying to experience this exquisite dessert! I mean . . . we were supposed to try and make one just like it right from your own kitchen, but I’m glad this place even had one, and we came just at the right time! They usually don’t offer this in their menu, don’t you know?” Lucy hesitated, looking both at her and then Emmet, who was still chewing a mouthful of that cake. With a big smile on Unikitty’s face, she begged: “You should try it! It’s a rarity!” but Lucy declined. “Aren’t you guys even bothered by all this cold? I’ll just have my fresh and warm Hawaiian pizza, thank you very much.” The moment she said it, Emmet then handed her a plate with slices of just that, which was already prepared well for her earlier.

“Oh, wow! Was it already here? Thanks Emmet! You knew me too well. You’re sweet!”

“Anything for you Lucy. I still feel bad you had to bother returning all the way to the house just to look for Rex. You didn’t have to—"

Suddenly, Lucy touched his mouth to stop him from talking, and kindly said:

“It’s fine, Emmet. It’s fine. You wanted to make sure we could all have some quality time together. I understand.”

Although Lucy initially wanted to return home just because she needed a scarf, she eventually decided to look for Rex as well, for Emmet’s sake. Thankfully, things didn’t get any more complicated than that. With everything finally taken care of, Emmet could actually relax for once; he has been frantic all day! He too deserved this downtime.

She smiled at Emmet, a gentle kind. She always looked beautiful that way, and it was enough to calm him down.

She slowly let her hand go from his lips, hoping Emmet would stop apologizing . . . because she really didn’t want any more discussion for a reason, but suddenly . . . she got a different reaction from him instead.

He snickered at her and said bluntly: “You really just want to dine in peace, don’t you?”

“Yes, Emmet. I am famished!”

Yep! He surely understood her pretty well. That’s why Lucy has been acting hastily ever since she went back home.

Then she swiftly took a big bite of her pizza, sinking into that delightful, creamy taste. “Hmm! This is really good! Could use a little hot sauce though.” At least Emmet had enough strength in his hands to assist her well. He reached out to simply grab a bottle of hot sauce, and lend it to her, receiving a quick “Thank you!” watching her chow down those slices of pizza. Metalbeard commented: “She’s just as hungry as a lassie on deck who just got her grub after bein’ lost in sea.” Unikitty then whispered to him: “Wow, that’s quite a way to put it.”

“What can I say? Rex is like a _snail_ as he is!” Lucy complained as she chewed, and then gulped it down before continuing, “And it was quite strange that he was driving his truck a lot cautiously than his usual stunt. He just had to make things worse for me! That Rex . . . ugh . . . he never changed.” She rolled her eyes in annoyance when she said the latter. That instantly reminded all of them about Rex’s whereabouts. He was supposed to show up along with her. Yet, he still wasn’t around.

“Speaking of which, where is he?” questioned Emmet, “Any sooner and he would miss out on all of this. It’s getting really late!”

As quickly as the moment he said that, it suddenly brought something back to Unikitty’s mind something important! Something she had been anticipating to hear from Lucy ever since this morning, that Lucy wouldn’t talk about unless if they’re on a particularly private moment. Sensing the urgency, she initiated to steer the situation. “Hey Wyldstyle, is Rex still in his truck?” she started. “Probably. He should be here any minute now,” Lucy shrugged, preferring to continue enjoying her pizza at the moment. Unikitty then faced to Emmet and requested him: “Would it be alright if you meet him halfway?” Like she expected, she heard a “Sure!” from him.

It was rather obvious he would fall for that.

Nevertheless, Emmet didn’t mind though. It was already at the back of his mind that Rex was hesitating to come . . . for whatever reason he would soon find out, so he gladly excused himself.

Benny eventually returned to their table, bringing with him some cups of crème brûlée and two glass servings of one strawberry and blueberry parfait. He then said to the gang: "I saw Emmet went out. Where is he going?" Unikitty replied to him in Lucy’s place: "He went out to get Rex . . . and with Emmet gone, this moment couldn’t be more perfect than it is, right Wyldstyle?” She then poked at Lucy, who was in the middle of her feast.

“What was that?” Lucy wasn’t listening.

Unikitty spoke to her again, but actually addressing it to Benny and Metalbeard:

“She’s actually been keeping something from us, something that’s mysteriously exciting! And I wanna elaborate _‘mysterious’_ . . . that’s because it is!”

Lucy just stared at her blankly the whole time.

“Hello? Earth to Wyldstyle! I’ve been waiting all day! You know? The thing you _wrote_?” she reminded her.

“The thing I wrote—Oh right! I almost forgot!”

There was a sudden beam of excitement slowly showing off from her face the moment she realized what Unikitty really meant. After she took a last-minute check looking around just to make sure it was really the four of them left alone on the table, she then took her last pizza bite, wiped her hands with a tissue, and she transferred to their side of the table as she grabbed her phone from her pocket.

“Okay, this is still a work in progress.”

She loaded up a video.

“Benny, Metalbeard, remember not a word to Emmet, and **especially** Rex, got it?”

* * *

Meanwhile outside the restaurant, Emmet was waiting for the elevator to reach to him. It took about some more minutes until it did, but his face instantly dropped to a frown once the door slid open. “Sorry mister, we’re all packed! You can use the stairs though,” sternly said the operator, and he quickly shut the door. “Ooookay . . . I’ll just walk fifty floors down then! Who knows how long that would take?” he complained.

“Y-Ya’ . . . Ya’ got that right kid!”

He abruptly heard someone coming to him from the staircase nearby, as that guy was panting extremely heavily, with literally ten steps left before reaching the floor where Emmet was standing on.

"Whoa! Rex?!"

After he finally stepped on the 50th floor, he slumped! Echoing throughout the hallway a strong moping pain; the kind of moping that sounded similar to Emmet when he’s overwhelmed with pain; his legs were seriously aching!

“Hahah, Emmet . . . y-you’re a sight for sore eyes . . .” he groaned.

Emmet quickly ran to help him get up.

“What happened to you?”

“N-Nothing, it’s nothing . . . argh!”

Rex yelped as he struggled to barely get on his feet, barely hanging onto Emmet’s back. As he fought to get some breath, he then said:

“D-Definitely not suffering from . . . climbing over a thousand and fifty steps . . . just to get here . . . Y-Yeah, I counted."

“You really climbed all the way up here?!”

“No, Emmet. I didn’t!” sarcastically, he expressed it in annoyance.

“No wonder Lucy even bothered getting here first. She said you were crawling like a _snail_," said Emmet. "W-Wha? No, I wasn't! She just left me in the dust before I could even catch up to her!" Rex complained, but Emmet just rolled his eyes, and continued: "Yeah right. May I remind you who got in here pretty late? I tried calling you, Rex. I called, and I called—"

"Okay, okay, I get it! I'm the _slowpoke_! Way to be a big help, **_bro!_**" he swiftly pushed Emmet out of irritation, refusing his help any longer, but it quickly became a stupid act because that only made him fall back on the floor right to his butt. Despite that, Emmet still reached out his hand, but Rex was stubborn. “Don’t bother! I’ll manage,” he spat at him.

It was at this point that Rex’s attention was caught onto Emmet’s hand that was actually wrapped with bandages . . . well, he glanced at both of Emmet’s hands now that he also noticed it was wrapped with bandages.

“Wait a minute . . . why are your hands covered up like that?” Rex asked in perplex.

“It’s . . . quite a story . . . Definitely not bruising them because I punched a falling building to save my life . . . and her," Emmet explained, slowly turning down to mumbling sounds towards the end.

"What was that? I can't hear ya'."

“Just let me help you!” Emmet persisted.

Rex hesitated, taking a keen look at Emmet and his hands again, slowly turning his own face into a scowl, like he figured something was up. Emmet, yet, continued reaching out, but Rex didn’t take it. He got up on his own, albeit struggling. However, after that little examination, he now had something he needed to say. “I know you’re not the type of guy who punches like me,” Rex began in a serious tone, “You just did a Master Breaker, didn’t you?”

“What? Hahah, n-no!”

Emmet quickly hid his hands, but he gradually became intimidated by that serious look of his . . . and Rex sure was serious. His eyebrow raised up when Emmet hesitated to explain. That look finally pushed him to speak up. “Okay, okay, I did it! It was Master Breaker, just like you taught me! B-But it wasn’t intentional, I swear! I know it’s kind of your thing, and that I shouldn’t be doing it anymore . . . Everyone’s freaking out about it! They remembered Arma-ma-geddon, and how it was used to destroy our universe and what not—” but his rambling got cut off when Rex tugged his hand out, closely examining it. Rex’s expression strangely turned infuriated, and he blurted out: “Don’t do it!”

“E-Excuse me? Don’t do what?”

> “That Master Breaker punch! Don’t do that **anymore**, especially **you** out of all people!” he said it out straight.

Emmet was astonished to hear that, yet, he could see where this is going. “Okay . . . I get you, Rex.” He grasped Rex’s point, as he also recalled how his other friends commented about his earlier; doing it was just risky, even if it was necessary. Then he sensed Rex gently rubbing his hand, and he heard him asking: “Are they numb?”

“A little,” Emmet promptly answered.

“Wow . . . They really got themselves in quite a shock! What on earth did ya’ even punch today?”

Turns out Rex never actually heard him mumble earlier after all, but that’s why he mumbled. Emmet couldn’t bring himself to answer that briefly and clearly. He really had a crazy day. Because Emmet took so long to explain, Rex just gave up waiting, and sighed in disappointment.

“I’m just telling ya’ to avoid this because I regretted teaching this to you, Emmet,” he let it out honestly, “This isn’t just any random punch where you just rely on your guns. Ya’ can’t really do this when you feel anything else deep down but . . . what I normally go through.”

“. . . What are you saying?”

“I can tell you’re mad,” Rex said it straight.

“What? Mad? Hahah! You’re crazy! I’m not mad! Of course not! I’m just fine! Happy and dandy! Mostly because the food is great here! Speaking of which, we should better get going—” “No!” Rex grabbed hold of Emmet’s arm so he’d stay put, “You’re mad at **me**! You’re just not admitting it!” Emmet was not liking what he’s trying to do, but Rex was really asking for it, so he let it all go of what he’s suppressing deep down right at Rex’s face:

“I really hate to confess this Rex, but yeah! You’re right! I am **mad** at **YOU**!

I can tell you were never really busy with your own things and your raptors.

Those were just your **stupid** excuses, just so you’d **brush me off** and the rest of our friends!

A-And you even DARED to do that for over a month!

W-Why—**WHY** are you doing this?!

Do you have any idea how **unbearable** your silent treatment really is?! **It HURTS!**”

Emmet’s sudden outburst caused Rex to hold back from speaking. That instantly reminded him of how Lucy just treated him throughout his ride a while ago. That did hurt. Emmet’s tone was provoking him into anger too, but he held it back as hard as he could. With his head down, shoulders lifted in tension, yet looking straight at him, he jumped immediately into an apology: “I’m sorry, Emmet, okay?” but there was a little hint of temper there that made his attempt to apologize rather unconvincing. Emmet just shook his head and grumbled: “Yeah right!” as he yanked his arm out of Rex’s grasp. Turning his back on him with arms crossed, he then grouched: “Like I ever done anything bad to you that I deserved this!”

Emmet went quiet. None of them spoke to one another. They just stood there. This boiled up Rex. He had to push himself hard just to get here, only to be treated like this?! But he immediately kept himself together, pausing just to think . . . trying to get himself into Emmet’s shoes if he really deserved this treatment from him. He had no idea how his recent absences would affect Emmet so much. Realizing this, his anger melted away and felt terrible instead, rubbing his arm in guilt.

Walking beside him so he’d see Emmet’s face, he admitted:

“You should know that I’ve never done any of that just to hurt ya’ . . . but now I know you were.

You have every right to be mad at me.

I know how ya’ feel . . .”

“Then **WHY**, Rex?! Tell me! Brushing us off like you’re suddenly disowning us . . .” Emmet harshly beseeched him with a stern look. “. . . I-It’s . . . hard to explain . . .” Rex hesitated. That only caused Emmet to utter a low growl at him. “I’m not lying Emmet!” defended Rex, “I tell ya’! I’m not! It . . . really is hard to explain . . .” Rex gave out a really deep sigh before he continued, “but . . . if there’s some way I could put it, then it would be this.” Emmet now brought his full attention to listen to him, yet still holding that same grouchy pose and expression.

“I get it why ya’ wanted all of us to hang out.

I realized that I needed it . . .

because I just wanna know if I . . .

. . . still even belong.”

“What are you talking about? Of course, you do!” said Emmet angrily in a reassuring way, “Isn’t this why I bothered inviting you? Why I even obliged?” But Rex felt a deep piercing pain when he thought about Emmet’s other friends, and he asked: “What about them? Do they want me here?” Unexpectedly, Emmet hesitated, and Rex quickly took note of that, solidifying his conviction that he was right. “W-Well,” Emmet gulped before he continued, “t-they . . . were really just confused why you suddenly stopped associating with them.” That was not the kind of answer Rex was expecting. It sounded like Emmet already knew something about the situation, so he didn’t care about explaining further anymore. He just let out an angry sigh, and looked away very displeased, distantly to the city lights through the glass wall of the hallway.

“Look, Rex . . .” Emmet begun, “It doesn’t matter anymore who started it, or who’s to blame. What matters is that we’re all here now, so that we could all start over. **You** could start over.” Then Rex felt Emmet’s hand gently landing on his shoulder, catching his attention. He glanced at it, then looked onto Emmet, and heard him say: “All this wouldn’t just mend by itself . . . You also need to make your step.”

“. . .

. . . Isn’t it why I’m here now?” Rex turned to him, trying to show a little grin.

That smile was enough to perk up Emmet’s mood. He smiled back at him in return, and replied:

“Precisely.”

Rex’s grin grew a little wider, now reassured that coming here in the first place wasn’t a bad move, thanks to Emmet’s prodding.

Emmet himself was glad, at the very least, that he finally heard from Rex all that he needed to hear. It was his aim from the start. He would never incline himself to resent against Rex, even if he may have a cause for complaint against him. He hoped that this changing point would eventually turn out for the better between them, and then the others sooner or later.

When things were seemingly settled, they headed back, Emmet hugging Rex halfway as they walked. Although, he initially hesitated to do that, but much to his surprise, Rex didn’t become bothered this time.

“Hey Emmet,” he heard Rex started, “I just wanna make sure that I meant it when I say, ‘I am sorry’. It was only until now that I realized I was just being like an ungrateful jerk.”

“I forgive you, Rex,” he said genuinely, not long after he smirked at him,

> “What is it they say sometimes? . . . That ‘_brothers fight’_?”

Rex beamed slightly more to that, albeit an unconfident one, but he gave a chuckle, and replied:

“Then I guess we’re still brothers.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is Part 1 of the whole dinner scene, and the next will be on the following chapter. ^^
> 
> This was planned to be like its own little culminating part, where almost everything that was raised in the previous chapters will be settled here.
> 
> You'll see how things will go through in the next chapter. >u>


	11. Chapter 11

###  **CHAPTER 11**

“No matter how you put it Wyldstyle, I’m sure he would love it very, very much!” commented Unikitty in adornment as she now saw most of the video being played alongside Benny and Metalbeard. “You all think so?” said Lucy in discontent. “I’m still not actually convinced of how the second part really sounds . . . and the bridge still needs lyrics!”

“I’m sure you can figure it out with the girls. Just let it take some time,” Unikitty reassured her. Then Benny said his comment, "I’m not really liking the beats though. I wanted something a little . . . retro."

“Wow, thanks so much for the feedback Benny,” Lucy said that sarcastically.

Metalbeard then pondered, uttering: “It be different from the song ye made for the radio . . . The one ye sang with yer old—”

“Ugh! Don’t even mention that annoying pop song Emmet loves to sing!” Lucy blurted out . . . completely unaware of who was suddenly behind her.

“You mean _‘Everything is Awesome’_?”

They all heard Emmet, accidentally overhearing the conversation, causing Unikitty, Benny and Metalbeard to gasp out loud instantaneously! Silencing the clamoring within the restaurant.

At once! Lucy paused the video in panic, and flipped the screen of her phone away from everyone’s sight! Then they all turned to their backs to see Emmet finally came back, along with Rex who suddenly looked apprehensive to their shocked reaction. The two boys found themselves being fixated by their friends, but all Emmet could express was a blank face, almost like he was in a state of disbelief about what he just heard from Lucy.

“. . . I thought,” Emmet broke the uncanny silence, “I thought you loved that music, Lucy. We always sing that together.”

“What? No! Wait, I mean **I DO! **I DO love singing that song with you Emmet! Uhh . . .” Lucy panicked, as she was hastening in sliding the phone screen in secret to hide that video away from display. “It’s just that, uhh . . . Like you said, we sing it all the time! At the kitchen, in the living room, even humming that song first thing in the morning.”

“Umm . . . Ooooookay?”

Everyone who were at the table suddenly eyed at Lucy, prompting her to change the situation.

“A-Anyways,” Lucy tried shifting the conversation, “I didn’t think you’d come back so soon, Emmet. And look! Rex’s here too! Come on, have a seat you two,” but Rex hesitated to take his. He excused himself, uttering: “I should . . . b-better get going.”

“Wait!” Emmet whispered to him, “Where are you going?”

“. . . To get some grub?” he answered.

“. . . You okay, Rex?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“But I already had stuff ready for . . . you.”

Rex just went off to the food stall without anymore letup, disrupting Emmet to even finish himself.

“. . . He’s not okay,” in pity, Emmet concluded.

* * *

The atmosphere of the restaurant eventually went back to its soothing state. While Rex was consciously and peculiarly taking a lot of his time picking the choicest of foods, Emmet and his friends continued on their feast, but things are a little weird this time. No one bothered conversing with one another. What was only audible was the clattering sounds as they eat. No one was even making any eye contact! His friends’ sudden shift of tone caught Emmet’s attention so much, it bothered him. Whatever happened around here when he was out, he guessed it had something to do with it. He could compare! There was a lot of chatter just before Rex arrived.

Is this what’s really all about?

Are they really doing this silent treatment again?

Why wouldn’t Lucy talk?

Why would she say something shocking about not liking the song they love?

He could clearly remember she really sounded genuine there. Did she really mean it?

Completely lost in this silence, all these questions echoed in Emmet’s mind over and over again, pressuring him from keeping quiet, until it ultimately pushed him to blurt it all out in discussion.

“I can’t take it anymore!” Emmet suddenly banged the table, causing Lucy to irk as she chewed on her pasta. “Can you all tell me what’s really going on here?”

Lucy caught sight of Benny looking at her nervously, but she just cautiously shook her said, sternly staring at him to remind him of what not to do . . . but no one was answering Emmet. This disturbed Benny, invoking him to say something.

“Uhh, Nothing! Nothing! We’re just . . . dining in peace? Apparently?” Benny pretended in ignorance.

“Come on, everyone! Stop playing tricks with me! I can tell something’s going on. It’s written all over your faces!” complained Emmet. “Blimey! Yer right, lad!” they heard Metalbeard exclaiming, as he suddenly looked at himself through the reflection of an opaque glass on the table, wiping some food mess off from his mouth in pretense. Then Benny pointed at Unikitty, “Oh look! There’s frosting all over her face too!” who was eating her ice-cream cake quite carelessly for some reason; almost like she’s really tensed. Plucking a tissue from the tissue box, Benny went on to wipe those off from her.

Lucy just facepalmed herself by all of this ridiculousness.

“Guys!! Please!” Emmet said upset, unknowingly catching Rex’s attention from the food stall. “You know that’s not what I meant! I saw you watching something from her phone,” he pointed at Lucy, “I heard music!” Each one of them was rigidly staring at one another at this point, unsure of what to say. Emmet could clearly notice this, and it really baffled him a lot. “Lucy,” he turned to her, making her startle, “I can’t really help but overthink what I just heard from you out of the blue—”

“Don’t overthink it, Emmet! I already told you. Nothing’s wrong. L-Let’s change the subject . . .” said Lucy swiftly.

“No, no, no!” he shook his head with a gesture, “Let’s **not** change the subject! This . . . this could be serious!”

“Hahah! S-Serious?!” Lucy laughed out loud, causing Emmet to raise his eyebrow.

Everyone else at this point was in the height of suspense. They made sure nothing gets spilled out about whatever they were keeping from him, but they all suddenly heard him apologizing. “I don’t get it. I had no idea that song bothered you so much Lucy. I mean . . . maybe you still love it? But maybe you just got sick of me singing it all the time . . . I-I’m sorry.”

“But I’m not,” Lucy refused to admit it.

“Then why would you say something like that?”

“D-Did I?”

“What?! Am I that deaf to you? I’m not like Rex!”

And very abruptly, Rex came back from the food stall with his own plateful of food, and sat beside Emmet, distracting everyone’s attention. Instantly, Emmet felt self-conscious about what he just uttered about him, so he turned to him and said: “No offense Rex,” with a big, awkward grin on his face. Rex just glared at him really unamusingly, for he heard what he said.

“Y-You know what?” they all suddenly heard Benny saying, “I think Metalbeard and I really **need** to go to the bathroom. Juuuuust for a little bit!” By force, he pulled Metalbeard’s metallic hand, but Metalbeard hesitated and whispered to him: “We’re abandoning ship?!” which Benny said back, whispering: “Yes! Wait—not really, but . . . oh just come on!!” Benny yanked him out, and Metalbeard just went along with the act.

The moment they left, Emmet noticed Rex’s face went droopy, as if he took their leave a little offensively. Concerned, he said to Rex: “Hey, you alright?” but Rex went on to change his expression, giving him a smiley nod instead. However, it was rather clear he was forcing that one real hard. Rex then said to him: “Like you said, the food’s great! It’s literally what I came for,” and then Rex faced back to his plate, and only his plate, to eat, instantly losing that smiley façade.

From here, Rex just minded his own business; not even bothering to talk anymore; being the most corner of the whole table couldn’t urge him having to converse with anyone. On Emmet’s other side, there was Lucy, and Unikitty in front from where she sat. They just went even quieter. This wasn’t helping his very troubled mind. It just drove him to the height of suspicion. He knew asking questions wouldn’t work. None of them even want to admit anything! Everything so far that’s been happening right in front of him could only make him conclude one thing.

“I see what’s really going on here,” he suddenly uttered in a serious note.

He glanced at each one of his friends individually, but none said a word. All this silence slowly drove him nuts inside. “. . . You’re all keeping something from me, don’t you all?” he further pushed it, impatiently waiting to see anyone might budge. Rex was actually listening to Emmet rambling by himself, so he asked in confusion: “Are you okay, Emmet?” Emmet answered him audibly for Lucy and Unikitty to really hear him, “I think someone here may be deceiving me with secrets.”

“S-Secrets? What?!” Lucy joined in, in pretense, “There are no secrets, Emmet! Hahah! You’re just taking all this way too deep. Just calm down,” but that little chortling of hers only made him even more serious. “Really Lucy?! Those two leaving all of the sudden? All those awkward staring? Suddenly, no one’s talking? And I still don’t get why you even said that earlier!”

Lucy just chuckled and laughed a bit more, but she was just asking Emmet to suspiciously glare at her, concluding: “. . . **_You_** are keeping something . . . I don’t believe this!”

“No, no, no, no! What I was trying to say is . . . umm . . . we should, uhh . . . sing something else for a change, you know? Something new?” Lucy explained in a tizzy, but then she heard Unikitty suddenly whispering to her: “What do you mean _‘something new’_?! You aren’t supposed to make _‘something new’_!!” She hushed her and whispered back: “I’m trying to change the subject!!” But those whispers were actually quite audible enough for Emmet to hear. Then he saw Lucy swiping on her phone screen again.

“What’s this . . . something new?” he raised his eyebrow. “Nothing! It’s nothing!” Unikitty suddenly interfered for Lucy, “We were . . . just talking about other things . . . that don’t involve you!”

“Oh wow Unikitty, you’re just making it worse!” Lucy swiftly whispered right back at her harshly, and immediately showed Emmet her screen with a photo of her with him, hanging out with Unikitty, Benny, and Sweet Mayhem in one of the rooms in Batman’s mansion. “We were just reminiscing about the times we sang other cool songs during a karaoke night. Remember that, Emmet? It was just like this! We had good food. Batman sure knows his lobsters! They’re really good! It’s a shame . . . they don’t have plenty of seafood options here tonight,” she went on rambling, trying to cover up. Emmet gently took her phone to look at that photo a little closer. Rex peered in too. After taking a closer look, Emmet then said to Lucy: “But we sang _‘Everything Is Awesome’_ that night too. I remember. You clearly loved singing that song with me.” Lucy just giggled while saying: “Of course we did, Emmet. That’s what I was trying to tell you. Maaaaybe I might be a little sick of singing that same song all the time . . . I mean, I was part of the original band before, but that shouldn’t change anything between—” she suddenly took an abrupt pause when she remembered Rex was right beside Emmet, but continued, looking straight to Emmet’s eyes, “—me and you, Emmet.”

Emmet heard her well, but he was still left curious. He then asked, looking straight at her: “Are you sure you’re not hiding anything else?”

She glanced back at Rex again, and then to Emmet, answering him: “. . . Not in a way to deceive you, Emmet. Trust me.”

However, Emmet wasn’t blind to catching some hints of insincerity from her words, and to think he was slowly inclining in giving her a benefit of a doubt. He said nothing back, but continued swiping through the pictures, somehow looking for anything that’s _“new”_.

Rex saw all those photos in a blink of an eye, but all that gave him one clear picture in mind, that those photos were all the times they hanged out together _without_ him. There were several pictures where the whole gang were together: there were picnic moments, gatherings at Emmet’s home, sleepovers at Batman’s mansion, parties at the queen’s castle, some random get-togethers within the city. Sure, Rex have been to all of those places, and has been with them on similar occasions before, but those photos were a lot newer, a lot more recent. All this made him recall everything why he was so inclined to avoid coming here in the first place. He gave up looking on those photos, and faced back to his food, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to eat anything anymore.

Nevertheless, in all this, Emmet wasn’t stopping. This made Lucy really uneasy. She then slowly reached out to her phone, saying a little hurriedly: “Okay Emmet, I think I need my phone now,” but Emmet suddenly held it away from her. “Emmet, give me back my phone,” she called again, but he didn’t listen. He only just continued swiping, becoming more intrusive by the second. This agitated her. She moved out of her place and went closer to him to grab her phone by force, but all the while, Emmet was becoming stubborn, not letting her phone go. He only just held it tighter, overcoming Lucy’s gentler pull. “Hey Emmet, give it back!” She tried harder, only for him to use both of his hands to keep her from tugging it out. “I said give it back!!”

Emmet was in the middle of a mental torment. He had already spent in agony trying to find out why Rex was ignoring him for over a month. Now this suddenly came up; this time, coming from his own special-best-friend! This seriously drove him into compulsion of finding out whatever she’s trying to hide. The way she’s acting right in front of her clearly confirmed it!

The harder she pulled, the more he went to further extremes. He had to get out from his seat, trying to keep that phone from her as far as possible, as she struggled to retrieve it back.

However, Emmet’s own grip could only get him so far.

His hands were still weak.

Suddenly, the phone slipped!

It slipped right out from his grasp, shooting out to hit the nearest person.

It hit on Rex’s head! Managing to catch the phone before it fell onto his plate.

“GIVE ME THAT PHONE!!”

Both Emmet and Lucy shouted at him, with a tone so distinctive from the other; Emmet had a hint of frustration to his, while Lucy sounded more anxious. That sudden shout only froze Rex right on the spot. “REX!” Emmet suddenly hollered, gesturing his hand to give it to him, but that tone only made him hesitate even more. This sudden situation he got himself into creeped him out! All of the sudden, Emmet and Lucy were suddenly fighting over a silly phone.

Lucy didn’t waste a second and took her opportune moment. She dashed ahead and seized hold of her phone before Emmet might do the same. That exasperated Emmet! He even bothered snatching that phone right off from Lucy, but it was already a little too late. He gnashed his teeth, his fists started to clench. Rex noticed those particularly familiar details suddenly coming from Emmet, alarming him!

“You better tell me what’s going on, Lucy!” Emmet suddenly said it out of anger.

“Emmet, stop! W-What has gotten into you?!” Lucy exclaimed in distress.

Knowing full well where this would lead to, Rex impulsively rushed in-between them, facing Emmet, trying to hold him back from Lucy, saying out loud: “Emmet, wait! Think about what you’re doing!”

“GET OUT of my way!” Emmet said grimly.

“Dude! Listen to me!! This isn’t YOU!!”

Rex had to shake him just so he’d snap out of it, but that only infuriated Emmet a lot.

He shoved Rex off!

He shoved him so hard, he fell headlong, tumbling onto the chairs where Emmet and Lucy sat, shocking everyone who saw it and heard the crash.

Everyone went stunned!

Even Emmet himself . . . of what he just did out of impulse.

He snapped back to his senses, shook to the very core, looking on Rex, who struggled on the floor in pain just to get a straight look at him in complete delusion. The pain didn’t matter to him, it was the fact that Emmet actually did that.

It was as if time just suddenly stopped in Emmet’s consciousness. He looked upon his own hands in dread, shocked about what he just did. He slowly realized that the whole time they were already in the middle of everyone’s attention, watching them, like they saw a spectacle, but particularly, everyone was fixated on him in shock; Rex, Lucy, Unikitty, even Benny and Metalbeard saw it from afar.

Everyone stared in silence.

Too tensed in shuddering, Emmet couldn’t utter anything.

Then Rex struggled getting up on his own, and muttered in a frustrated tone: “I think that’s enough **pain** for today.” Emmet, despite trembling, still tried to help, but Rex resisted him. This caused Emmet to whimper out: “I’m . . . I’m sorry, Rex. I—I . . . I don’t know what got into me—”

“**I know!**” Rex exclaimed, jolting Emmet.

So worked up in agitation, Rex had to immediately restrain himself, but he instantly regretted his decision to glance at Lucy afterwards, for she showed a very disappointed expression at him. That shrunk him back. He repeated saying to Emmet: “. . . I know,” murmuring this time in fear of her. With his head down so low, he then said in somber:

“I should . . . get out of here.”

“W-What? Wait, no!”

“Stop trying, Emmet . . . I lost my appetite.”

Nervously rubbing his arm again in guilt, he walked out of the scene, leaving Emmet behind in the restaurant with the others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wooh! Wow . . . This was . . . a really, really, really difficult chapter to write, along with Chapter 10! Took me two whole weeks to actually completely finish these two! These chapters were quite the risky ones. I gotta tell you! xD
> 
> Despite how excited I am to finally write these dinner chapters, these were by far the times where I was really nervous about writing it all. It's just a game changer! o.O
> 
> You guys were originally gonna only read 11 chapters for this first batch, but like it was said before, you're also gonna have Chapter 12 for this!
> 
> This next chapter is gonna be something.


	12. Chapter 12

###  **CHAPTER 12**

Yawning up to another morning, Rex got up from his own bed, albeit feeling really tired still. This was a disappointing start; he just shook his head, sighing, hoping when would he ever get himself a nice nap after everything that’s been happening. Frankly, he couldn’t remember anything at all during his sleep. No percussions from nightmares, or anything like that. At least! Yet, he’s still all worn out, as if the stress from yesterday never really left him. It was a little weird. He felt a little lightheaded. Mustn’t be all that coffee he’s been constantly drinking in a perpetual habit? He’s not sure. He took a glimpse to check on his raptor clock, and saw that the time was already ten in the morning. “What the—I woke up late again?!” he flustered in dismay, “How many hours did I—” he paused to count. One, two, three . . . and he gave up. Now he wondered if he needed some more sleeping hours just to feel a little better. Even so, it was already pretty late to do that. He was getting hungry . . . and at this point, he also realized his morning routine was ruined again. “Okay, fine! I’ll just eat and nap all day then! Great!! I have no other plans today anyways . . . Hahah! Yeah, screw that anniversary! I don’t care!” Rex left his room all agitated and went straight to the kitchen; not even bothering to change out from his pajamas anymore.

Feeling tired was one thing, but actually sensing that his walking was somewhat like he’s moving in water was one unexpected factor; almost like he could float, but he was not. He was still walking on his house floor like normal. With tired eyes, he tried looking around, and instantly questioned why the atmosphere seemed like nighttime; indoor lights were the only things lighting the bluey, metallic interiors. Is the weather bad today or something? It must be all that bad morning woozy feeling. He should feel better after a little breakfast meal. The kitchen surely is a priority right now.

. . . It took quite a while for him to reach there though.

His house was definitely too spacious for any rushed navigation.

“I should really add some built-in autowalk systems or something,” Rex thought, struggling to move about.

Conveniently soon enough, he finally got to the kitchen, leaning onto a partition wall for a little bit of break from exhaustion. No joke! Rex was really worn out! Does he even have the strength to cook anything at this point? Maybe even microwave something instant? Where are his raptors?

Just as soon as he thought of them, one of his raptors came to him, giving him a cup of coffee. “C-Connar?” he looked up, recognizing the raptor, as it uttered to him a quite mellow morning roar. Taking a closer look at the coffee he was given, he saw it using his personalized mug again, the one with the _‘Rex loves vest’_ print. Being this close to the cup, he picked up the scent of the coffee. That cause him to complain: “Black coffee?! Wait, wait . . . Connar, that’s nice and all, but I didn’t expect ya’ to be doing this in a daily basis all of the sudden, and I’m not in the coffee mood today . . . This is supposed to be the Other One’s thing, ya’ know? Where is he? He should be here after I took him home yesterday.”

Strangely, hearing Connar’s reply instantly turned him bewildered.

“What?! What do you mean he’s still with Emmet?” And right at this moment, he knew something wasn’t making sense. There seemed to be an undeniably weird pattern going on around here:

Waking up at ten, two hours before lunchtime?

Walking to the kitchen only to see Connar again giving him the same coffee in the exact place and time?

Only now he has this weird sensation like he’s on water?

Inside, he swiftly felt a troubling sense of trepidation.

“G-Gimme that coffee!!” Rex yanked out that coffee from Connar’s grasp, and quickly took a long sip; gulping down that hot coffee, no longer caring how it’ll burn his tongue. With his eyes shut, he focused on sensing that warm gulp going down his throat, but after that, he felt nothing. Despite how it seemed to look like it’s hot, it didn’t actually feel like it at all; not the usual pleasurable sensation he often felt after a sip. Once he opened his eyes in shock to the experience, he suddenly noticed that the raptor was already gone.

“Connar?” he called, looking around to look for it, but he couldn’t see it.

That finally allowed him to catch his attention towards the glass window right beside him. Once he got to see the view, clearly grasping it, he immediately became stunned when he realized that the view was so very wrong.

He went speechless for a second.

He couldn’t believe that he was not facing the Syspocalypstar city view from here, but . . .

“S-Space?! Why . . . Why am I in space?!”

He questioned the fact how he managed to get into space right from home. No wonder he felt like he’s underwater. His movement dragged slow . . . but somehow, it’s only him alone that’s going through such a phase. Connar couldn’t just easily disappear like it did. He knew he himself could not! “Hey Connar! Can you hear me?! Who the heck turned this house back into a ship and blast us all out into space?!”

“. . . Turn around,” Rex suddenly heard someone from behind. At once, he recognized that voice way too clearly before he even saw who it was!

Rex gasped and exclaimed in disbelief:

“E-EMMET?!”

“Yup!” Emmet agreed, and greeted him: “Good morning, brother! Heheh . . . You’re not supposed to be up this late, ya’ know?” but he greeted Rex with a confident grin, a creepily cocky kind of grin, almost like he was out of his usual innocent personality. He even posed himself with his hands on his hip so boldly, showcasing what he just wore for the day.

“Emmet, why . . . why are you wearing my—”

“Oh, this? Cool, right!” Emmet gestured proudly to the vest he’s wearing, “I can’t believe I even threw away my own Rex vest you gave me back at planet Undar. That was a waste . . . ‘cause I almost forgot how awesome it really is to be . . . **you**.”

Rex’s eyes widen out in horror to hear that statement Emmet himself just uttered. After all the times they’d hang out together, he’d never envisioned him saying anything like this. This is so wrong! There’s no way Emmet could even rebuild his home back to a ship without his consent or instruction. Rex is the only one who knew how to reconstruct this place back into his Rexcelsior ship! And there’s no freaking way Emmet would ever wear his own Rex clothes, pretending so much to be just like him!

“No . . . Emmet, this . . . this isn’t you! SNAP OUT OF IT!” said Rex in desperation.

“What are ya’ talking about?” Emmet ignored him, as he then wore Rex’s gloves as the last thing that completes all of Rex’s causal appearance, concealing his bandaged hands from within. Facing to his wrist as he clenched it, he fixed his gaze right back at Rex with a wicked grin, “Aren’t you my **future** self? Isn’t it inevitable?”

“N-NO! You—You made a CHOICE!” Rex refuted him, as he was slowly losing control over his coffee at this point; it was spilling out.

Then suddenly, someone else came from behind Emmet and disagreed. “No, Rex,” said she. When Rex recognized who that was, it completely threw him to incredulity. He couldn’t believe his own eyes whom he was seeing. That finally caused him to lost hold of his mug; it fell to the floor and broke into pieces!

“L-Lucy?” stuttered Rex, and his mouth continued shuddering, “Y-You’re . . . H-How . . . H-How did that also fit you?!”

“Eh,” Lucy shrugged, wiping some little taint off of her Rex vest she’s wearing. “This was specially tailored for me. Just look at how it fits! Susan even got all the details right! Even all those torn off parts, and that green little initial. So intricate. So accurate.” Seeing them together actually wearing something that was beyond their own natural preferences disturbed Rex so much, he drove him to realize things around here aren’t really what they seemed to be anymore.

“This isn’t real . . . This **can’t** be real!”

He gripped his head so hard, he tried shaking himself off from what he now believed to be another bad dream, but he failed. He couldn’t get this to get away!

Lucy harshly pointed out: “It’s because of you, Rex, Emmet turned out to be just like you! But now I realized . . . I was wrong all along.” That caused him to stop trying to snap himself out, looking straight at her, uttering a really perplexing: “H-Huh?!”

She then continued: “This wasn’t such a bad thing after all; my Emmet now all grown up, mature, and responsible, yet he’s still looking pretty adorable. That’s a neat plus!” Lucy’s tone suddenly went very passionate in the latter, as she gently rubbed Emmet’s face. Then Emmet chuckled, looking at Lucy in adornment, and embraced her halfway, admitting: “Thanks to you, bro, now I have become somebody Lucy could be proud of! Hahah! Can you believe it? She’s a **fan of me!**”

“Y’ALL DON’T MAKE ANY SENSE!” yelled Rex, strongly offended by their public display of affection. Then he heard Emmet say to him: “Now that you’ve helped me this far, you have no more use to me . . .” Emmet snapped his finger, calling out his own raptor, who arrived in the nick of time.

“T-The Other One?! Wait! NO! He—He’s not your raptor! He’s MINE!” angered Rex.

“Tsk! Tsk! Not anymore, and so does all of your other raptors, bro,” Emmet denied him, gesturing out his index finger, grimly continuing: “We don’t need two of us roaming around in this universe any longer. It’s gonna create a time paradox, don’t ya’ know that? Heheh, yeah, I have been watching movies.”

“N-No, I can’t believe—YOU’RE NOT GONNA GET AWAY WITH—” before Rex could make his move, the Other One instantly blocked his way, and harshly thrusted his chest, pushing him down against the floor. Rex struggled with all his might, but he was unable to get off from the raptor’s strong thrust.

Then Emmet cackled. “Oh, I can, and I have.” Then switching to a serious note, he told his raptor: “Dispose of him, or better yet . . . get rid of him.”

“Wait! NO! Ya’—YA’ CAN’T!” Rex panicked, struggling even more while on the floor, trying to force out the raptor’s arm out from pushing against his chest, but because he was quite immobilized by this dragging physical sensation in space, he just couldn’t. He was weakened. This was becoming hopeless! Seeing his raptor was inclining to obey Emmet rather than him, he cried: “L-Listen to me! You can’t do this! I’m—I’m your REAL raptor trainer!! YA’ HEAR ME?!”

The raptor refused to listen.

It opened its mouth, about to swallow him whole.

“NO! NOOOOO!!!”

“STOP! OTHER ONE! P-PLEASE!! STOOOP!!!” screamed Rex in fright, as he felt the raptor’s tongue licking all over his face. He shoved the raptor’s head away, stopping it from doing so. Wiping all that dribbling saliva off from his sight as he is able to, he saw the raptor, despite the darkness of the room, was still in front of him up so close. That freaked him out! “G-Get—GET AWAY FROM ME!!” but the raptor was just staring at him, doing nothing of the sort he thought it would. He heard it groaning, and was about to lick him again, but he yelled: “DON’T!” gesturing to stop it from coming any closer, and it did just so.

In this momentary pause, Rex looked around, and realized he was still laying on his own bed, neatly tuckered up, with the bedsheet still covering over his lower body. What he just experienced was indeed another nightmare; another really crazy one too! His heart still palpitated so hard, he was still on the edge on what he dreamt about, gasping for air very heavily and quickly. The room was still dark, only the moonlight shining through the window from his left side. He immediately went to check the time, looking for his raptor clock beside him on his night table, and saw it was still ten in the evening. He couldn’t believe the night was still this early! He only just started his nap, and then that nightmare began as soon as he did?! He shuddered in thinking what more he would have to go through if he bothered sleeping again.

Then his own thoughts just suddenly and vividly replayed the whole nightmare he just had, causing his emotions to swell up like a snap, making him tear up. He just grabbed the raptor’s head to hug it out of desperation. The Other One was staggered, but it let itself be. Rex instantly felt ashamed by this, and he tried his hardest to seep back those tears in, but the hug he’s doing wasn’t helping it to stop. He let the raptor go, but that caused him to become very disoriented within himself. His fists were fidgeting, so craving just to grab onto something. He couldn’t help it. He had to hug his own arms involuntary. In deep pity, the raptor pressed its own head onto Rex’s head, rubbing against it, trying to comfort him. It uttered more audible groaning noises, but Rex remain unchanged in his position, refusing to respond to what his raptor was trying to do.

Only, his thoughts sank down, completely lost in the memory void, as it shuffled and played about like a film operating fast-forward, until he remembered someone telling him from a particular day during the year in his life in Syspocalypstar something that he refused to admit it to be true . . . until tonight.

“. . . She was right,” muttered Rex all of the sudden, slowly hiding his face within his palms in shame.

“We just can’t be brothers . . .

Not like this, Emmet . . .

. . . We just can’t!”

* * *

At this part of the hour, Emmet and every one of his friends had already left the restaurant hours ago, and had returned back to their own respective homes. Emmet was now alone on the backyard of his little home, leaning onto a railing and gazing to the view of the mountain ranges as he felt that cold night breeze. After all that had happened today, he couldn’t bring himself to be with any one right now.

He had to think.

There was a lot to think about.

He had a long and quiet time of solitude there, but he would have company again soon enough. He then sensed Lucy coming to him from inside the house, slowly and cautiously. Then she stood beside him, looking onto the same view he’s gazing at, but Emmet hesitated to face to her. He could somewhat notice she herself couldn’t do the same. He’s not really sure if Lucy would like to, but he surely doesn’t want to! He was deeply ashamed after what he just did back at the resto. If it wasn’t for Rex, he could have hurt her . . . and he couldn’t even bear to begin thinking how things might have turned out between the two of them if he went any further than that. Nevertheless, he felt really guilty. He couldn’t stay shut. He had to say something to her:

“Lucy—”

“Emmet—”

Facing at each other, they started, but stopped when they saw they were interfering with one other. Both hesitated to speak again. They just stared eye to eye . . . but because Emmet couldn’t bear his own guilt deep down, he immediately gave that up and looked even further away from her. But unlike Emmet, Lucy couldn’t face away. She wouldn’t. She was deeply concerned about him. She hoped he’d continue what he was about to say, but now he was even more ashamed to talk at this point.

She knew she had to start from somewhere.

“Listen,” Lucy began, “I just want to tell you that I’m already done fixing the place. If you want to rest now, then you can.”

“. . . Thanks, Lucy,” Emmet replied after a little hesitation, “But . . . you go on ahead . . . I want to stay out here just a little longer.”

She heard him well, but despite what he said, she was firm enough to stay right where she is, so she didn’t budge. As much as she herself had a lot in her mind that she had to say, she didn’t do so. She just waited . . . until Emmet would initiate to speak up again. Lucy already knew that when things get bad, he’d mutter about stuff that’s bothering him. As long as she’d stay where she is, she knew he’d eventually do so. Like she expected, Emmet turned back to face her. He looked distraught, but once he saw Lucy expressing a deep worry on her face, it finally provoked him to speak his mind out.

“How is it that you could still look past what I did?” asked Emmet in a serious note.

“I knew it wasn’t you,” Lucy promptly answered in genuine concern, bringing herself to hold onto his shoulder.

“It’s funny,” Emmet chuckled, but in a tone of pessimism, slowly shrinking back and looked away from her again, “I seemed to have forgotten how to do the same.”

Lucy tried not to speak. Instead, she embraced him halfway, holding him a little closer to incite him to continue speaking up.

“I—I don’t know Lucy. I . . .” Emmet began, deeply sighing in the process, “I really messed up. I . . . I almost hurt you. I have no idea why I even did such a thing! I . . . I just don’t know why . . .”

Lucy continued listening, slowly rubbing his shoulder to comfort him.

“I guess things were just so hard today. I even failed to do the thing I was supposed to do. I ruined everything,” Emmet said in defeat, and looked down, so very down. He could only mutter so sadly when he continued: “I thought I could give Rex the things that made me happy . . . I just want to be a good brother.”

“But you’re already doing that so well,” Lucy assured him.

“I dunno,” Emmet doubted, “I tried. I always tried. I couldn’t bear to see him miserable, so I tried all that I can to lift his spirits up, but . . . I dunno why he’d eventually shut himself off from the start. It’s like whatever I did in the past just all ended up failing bad. Have we been doing something wrong? Have I?” He faced her so desperately, but Lucy couldn’t bring herself to answer those sensitive questions. She waited for him to utter more. Because of that, Emmet went back to look so down again, and gave off another very heavy sigh of regret. “After today, I don’t know what to do. I tell you Lucy, I really messed everything up . . . I’m just terrible,” he badly admitted.

Emmet at this point was just blurting out wild talk, letting out anything and everything that discouraged him. He blamed himself a lot. He placed himself in extreme burden, sometimes a lot more than he should be putting himself into. Lucy perceived this wasn’t the right time to discuss everything he expressed. The first thing she had to do was to help him feel better.

Thankfully, she didn’t come here to be with Emmet unprepared.

“Emmet,” Lucy begun, “let’s take a seat.” She referred to the double-decker couch that was just near them. She tugged him to come with her, and he did just so. Then they sat together, facing each other, but Emmet was still very melancholy. He couldn’t bear to face up to her, until Lucy showed him something that sparked his eye a little. She then said: “I figured this might be the right time to show you what I have been keeping from you, so I thought you might want to see it now.”

She showed to him a well-sized book.

“Wha—What’s this?

A . . . journal?

You’ve been writing journals this whole time?” Emmet asked intrigued.

“Not really,” Lucy giggled a bit, “Only, ever since I began my music career, until the time I gave it up in shame.” Emmet stared at her in disbelief, but in the height of curiosity, he opened her journal and randomly went to a page somewhere in the middle. He read aloud the first thing that written on it:

_18_ th _ of April_

_ Candy and I, along with the rest of our band members, could finally travel through the most remote part of the world, to be on stage playing our most popular song ‘Everything is Awesome’. We worked hard to spread its positive message far and wide._

Emmet expressed a little smile when he read that part. He already knew she was the one who actually wrote that song, but it was a pleasant thing to actually see how long she actually treasured the meaning of the song he loved. To think he even doubted her earlier back at the buffet . . . He took a glance at her, and saw she was showing a smile too. Then he went off to another page, and read what’s in it:

_21st of July_

_ We Master Builders celebrated our freedom through a concert we did just for them. Like Cole said, more than ever we all need to fight for our rights to travel and mingle and build! We hoped this song could continue to ring in the hearts of free-spirited ones loud and clear._

Speechless on where this was actually heading, Emmet intriguingly flipped to another page.

_12th of May_

_Helped our brotherhood build tunnels in secret as we went into hiding—_

“Wait, Lucy—Did you . . . did you actually do all this? That song . . . _‘Everything is _Awesome’, I never thought that song meant so much to everyone back then, and you!” Emmet was deeply impressed. Then Lucy explained: “Until it became so mainstream and manufactured, people just seemed to only enjoy the music, but the message ultimately lost its truer essence. Everyone gave up on it back at the war with the Systar System . . . even me.”

“Woah, Lucy! What you did was . . . just amazing!” Emmet beamed up, “You went around the world, just so you could help the Master Builders continue resisting the tyranny of President Business, but . . . now I don’t get it why you were suddenly so ashamed by all of this. You literally blacken your hair, and then hid your past from everyone else, including me.”

“Well, when he steadily became more successful in ruling over us, singing songs eventually became . . . impractical. It wasn’t the most grown-up thing to do, so I decided to change so I’d fit in.”

“Then you went off to search for the Piece of Resistance so you’d be—”

“The special,” Lucy finished Emmet’s sentence, giggling as she said it. She continued with a grin: “And we both know too well how all that turned out,” nudging Emmet so he’d also laugh along with her a bit. “Oh Lucy,” Emmet soon started when he calmed down, saying with a gentle smile, “I never regretted the day I met you. It was . . . the start of the most special days of my life, because **you** are special to me. You always were.” Lucy’s smile went broader when she heard him say that, for he said it so passionately. She couldn’t help that really sweet and warm feeling inside, she bit her lip. Then all of the sudden, Emmet raised another question: “But why did you decide to show me all of this out of all the days we’ve been together?”

“Emmet,” Lucy started to explain in her most genuine tone, “ever since the day I showed you I was the one who wrote that song, I made you a promise that I will never keep anymore secrets from you ever again. That’s why—” she then picked up her phone, and showed to him a musical sheet. Emmet peered at it, analyzing it, until he got what she’s trying to point out. “Wait! You’re . . . You’re writing a new song?!” he said shocked. “This was kept from you for a reason. I wanted it to be a pleasant surprise, so that one day, we might sing this song together! Until, of course . . . when it’s completely ready, but as of now . . . It’s not . . . That’s why I couldn’t tell you,” said Lucy in embarrassment. “Oh man!” Emmet slapped his own thighs to that realization, “If only I could have known! I wouldn’t have overreacted that much back at the buffet. I’m . . . I’m sorry, Lucy. I know you’ve forgiven me now but . . . I just had to say it.” Then Emmet held both of Lucy’s hands, gripping them softly as he placed them closer to his chest before he continued: “I really, really, really mean it. I am sorry.”

Lucy gave him a very reassuring smile, almost looking like a romantic one. That really soothed Emmet deep down, as he could finally gaze onto her beautiful eyes without any more guilt and shame. They stayed that way for a bit while, enjoying each other’s company so intimately. During all that, Emmet was contemplating everything Lucy just revealed to him from the journal, and then he told her: “So, you really don’t hate _‘Everything is Awesome’_ after all, huh?”

“To tell you the honest truth . . . I don’t think I ever will be, but I just want you to know that even though at times I may get sick of hearing that song, I still loved it for what it means deep down, more than you might ever come to realize. It reminds me to always keep on the lookout for whatever good comes in life.

I see that a lot in you, Emmet . . . which is why I couldn’t help but be so concerned that you seemed to have lost your way.”

Emmet instantly got her point. That caused him to frown a little, looking away a bit. He recalled how he’s been acting all day; how he was mostly stressed out and been suppressing a lot of anger. Then he suddenly felt her lifting up his face, and he heard her say:

> “Emmet . . . the reason why I fell in love with you in the first place is because of the person you truly are:
> 
> You are kind, so innocent, very sweet . . . and most of all . . .
> 
> . . . **always** positive.

You’re the most positive person I know! And you never looked on anything else but that.

I love that in you, Emmet.

I don’t want that part of you to change. Ever.”

Emmet heard her well, and fell into a deep thought. The more he did, the more he became pressured about her kind request.

He admitted:

“. . . I remember it used to be so easy.”

“That’s why I want to give you this,” Lucy suddenly added, and she showed him another book that was just like hers, and she handed it to him. “What is this? Another one of your journals?” questioned Emmet. Then she clarified: “It is a journal, but this one is yours. I want you to have one for yourself.” Emmet didn’t expect this at all. He opened the new journal he was given, and looked upon the blank pages, but he felt quite unsure because he never wrote a journal before in his life. “But . . . what should I write? Where should I start?” he asked, which Lucy replied: “Emmet, find a way to fill those pages. You can start with whatever comes to mind the good things you’ve done throughout the year.” It was a good suggestion, but he couldn’t understand the purpose of all this. “How will writing a journal help me?” he questioned her. “It’s not always easy to be positive when things get tough. That’s where writing comes in. When you spend your mind writing them down, it will help you focus on the things you treasure the most.” Lucy explained.

“Oh Lucy,” Emmet began with a sigh, “you’ve done so much just to make me feel better. This journal, these bandages, and your company . . . I couldn’t thank you enough from the bottom of my heart.” He said that with the kindest smile he could show, and right away, he gave her a really sweet hug, which Lucy appreciated so much, hugging him back.

“I love you, Lucy,” said Emmet.

“I love you too, Emmet,” Lucy responded.

Then they let go off their hugs, and held each other’s hands, giving one another a tender kiss right on the lips.

“Are you ready to get in back with me? One hour later and it’ll be midnight,” said Lucy, but Emmet replied after a little hesitation: “. . . You go on ahead. I just want to stay here for a little while to think about everything you said tonight.”

“Alright. Goodnight, Emmet.”

“Goodnight, Lucy.”

Then she took her leave, taking with her own belongings, giving him one last glance before she went back inside. Emmet was now all alone, but this time he felt the burden he had was completely gone. He could now gaze upon the mountains with a clearer mindset. He thought about the journal, and what he could do with it, so he looked back to the journal Lucy gave her. He sifted through the empty pages, until he reached at the back cover that had a embossed, written marking on it that reads:

_“Be true to yourself._

_— Lucy”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is quite a way to end the first batch of chapters! =)
> 
> I really, really love how it wrapped up here in the end. That genuine moment with Lucy and Emmet together was just so heartwarming to me. I really enjoyed writing that part so much~ <3 ^w^
> 
> But the story is far from over at this point. Rex still has his own issues he had to go through.  
More chapters are still on the works, and later I'll be able to update this story with the second batch of chapters! ^w^
> 
> For now, I hoped you enjoy the ride so far with the story, and I am very curious to know your thoughts from here. =D  
Thank you so much for reading this far, you guys!
> 
> Till the next batch of chapters!~


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